Assessing the Effects of Risk Interdependency, Social Norms, and Costs on Homeowners' Wildfire Mitigation Decisions using Choice Experiments

房主在火灾易发地区的决定在决定野火的发生和影响方面起着至关重要的作用。这些决定是相互依赖的：每个家庭的行为都会影响邻居的选择。这项研究探讨了两条连接房主选择的途径：风险相互依赖（即，事实上，任何个人面临的风险都受到邻近财产的缓解水平的影响）和社会规范（特别是，突出邻居之间高缓解水平的比较信息可能会鼓励家庭提高其缓解水平）。这项研究涉及一项基于网络的调查，对居住在科罗拉多西部斜坡火灾多发地区的房主进行调查，以衡量风险相互依赖性、社会规范和成本对降低风险决策的影响。该方法结合了观测和实验数据收集，以分别确定风险的相互依赖性和社会规范的信息对减灾行为的影响。具体而言，调查工具涉及1）关于当前知识，风险认知和实践的观察数据; 2）不同邻居缓解水平，社会规范信息和成本的选择实验，以评估这些因素对野火缓解行为的影响。该项目的智力价值在于整合了两个研究方向，这两个方向分别追求对风险相互依赖性和社会规范的理解。选择实验的使用也克服了纯观察研究的挑战，在纯观察研究中，很难将因果社会效应与社会群体内共同行为模式的其他解释（如共同特征或影响）分开。与此同时，观察数据将实验结果置于背景中，并有助于为数据分析和政策建议提供信息。 在过去10年中，美国各地因野火而造成的经济和社会成本增加。面对日益增加的野火危险，需要采取多尺度行动，以有效降低火灾风险。特别是，个人房主通过采取（或不采取）行动来减轻其私人财产的野火风险，发挥着核心作用。这项研究有助于对火灾易发地区房主形成野火相关行为的因素的了解。 更具体地说，通过关注家庭在面临野火风险时相互影响的方式，研究结果可以帮助制定政策，利用社会规范的力量，在面临相互依存的风险时增加私人缓解行动。这项研究测试了一个程序是否给房主社会比较信息（例如，“你做的野火缓解工作比你75%的邻居少。“）可以诱导行为改变。所获得的见解可以为目前从事社区外展的森林和火灾管理人员提供直接反馈，可能为旨在减少野火风险的计划的设计提供信息。

Homeowners' decisions in fire-prone areas play a crucial role in shaping wildfire occurrence and impacts. These decisions are interdependent: each household's actions can affect the choices of neighbors. This study explores two pathways linking homeowners' choices: risk interdependency (i.e., the fact that the risk that any individual faces is affected by the level of mitigation on neighboring properties) and social norms (specifically, the possibility that comparative information highlighting high levels of mitigation among neighbors may encourage households to increase their mitigation levels). The research involves a web-based survey of homeowners living in fire-prone areas of Colorado's Western Slope to measure the effects of risk interdependency, social norms, and costs on risk reduction decisions. The approach combines both observational and experimental data collection in order to separately identify the influence of risk interdependency and social norms messages on hazard mitigation behavior. Specifically, the survey instrument involves both 1) observational data on current knowledge, risk perceptions, and practices; and 2) choice experiments that vary neighbors' mitigation levels, social norms messages, and costs in order to assess the impact of these factors on wildfire mitigation behaviors. The intellectual merit of this project lies in the integration of two strands of research that have separately pursued the understanding of risk interdependency and social norms. The use of choice experiments also overcomes the challenge of purely observational studies, in which it is difficult to separate causal social effects from other explanations for common patterns of behavior within social groups, such as shared characteristics or influences. At the same time, the observational data puts the experimental results in context and helps to inform the data analysis and policy recommendations. In the past 10 years, areas throughout the United States have incurred increased economic and social costs due to wildfire. In the face of increasing wildfire hazards, action at multiple scales is required to effectively reduce fire risk. In particular, individual homeowners play a central role through the actions they take (or do not take) to mitigate wildfire risk on their private property. This study contributes to a growing body of knowledge on the factors that shape wildfire-related behaviors by homeowners in fire-prone areas. More specifically, by focusing attention on the ways in which households can influence each other in the face of wildfire risk, the results can help to inform policies that harness the power of social norms to increase private mitigation actions in the face of interdependent risk. The research tests whether a program giving homeowners social comparison messages (e.g., "You are doing less wildfire mitigation than 75% of your neighbors.") could induce behavior change. The insights gained can provide direct feedback to forest and fire managers currently engaged in community outreach, potentially informing the design of programs aimed at reducing wildfire risk.