Doctoral Dissertation Research: Factors Influencing Risk Perception and Movement Decisions in Coastal Louisiana

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Short-term environmental disturbances and long-term environmental change have displaced millions worldwide. The US Gulf Coast region is especially vulnerable to the impacts of hurricanes, sea level rise, land subsidence, and flooding. Some parishes in Louisiana have lost over 90% of their land, largely due to environmental changes. What socioeconomic and cultural factors influence perceptions of environment risk and migration? This project investigates factors not traditionally associated with the environment, including ties to place, strong social relationships, and counter perceptions of environmental risk, that might keep people in place, despite environmental risk. Migration theory suggests that behavior is largely linked to economic factors, such as income opportunities or life ambitions. This research, which trains a graduate student in methods of rigorous, scientific data collection and analysis, will investigate whether, and to what extent, environmental perceptions impact movement decisions. Improved understanding of movement decisions can inform local and state decision makers, yielding more precise composite descriptions of their constituents and likely behavioral outcomes, enabling better prediction of migration patterns and strategic planning. Environmental perceptions are also of value to the emergency and first-response communities when they confront new environmental dangers. The ability to better communicate environmental risk or danger can ultimately help to save lives.Charlotte Till, under the supervision of Dr. Shauna BurnSilver of Arizona State University, will explore the relationship between risk perceptions and migration decisions. This research will be conducted in Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana, an ideal setting for studying risk where there are both acute and chronic stressors on movement behavior. Hurricanes pose a severe seasonal threat to this area, but sea level rise and land subsidence represent cumulative risks and a new everyday reality for coastal people. During pilot study work in the area in 2016 the researchers found that relative to younger residents, older residents had less intention to leave despite known risks, and factors such as home, family, or community were important features of the environment. Based on survey and interview methodologies this research will first identify how the environment is perceived, and then investigate the influence of these perceptions on movement decisions. Survey responses will form the baseline data representing local perceptions, and then a subset of respondents will be invited to interviews allowing the investigator to explore movement logic(s) and the significance of identified influence factors for their decision making. Text analysis tools will be used to analyze interview data. Examples of the insights possible through the findings of this work include: how movement decisions are made, what factors result in place attachment outweighing risk, and how environmental factors interact with movement decisions. By actively incorporating individuals who do not move, this project is targeting an understudied but critical group for analyzing human movement patterns. By drawing participants directly from the parish this research may spur greater public engagement with science, contributing toward greater public scientific literacy. This research contributes to development of the migration literature on the role of the environment in movement decisions and factors impacting those decisions. This project will also facilitate improved understanding and engagement among communities, emergency managers, and municipal respresentatives.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.