Doctoral Dissertation Research: Social Opportunity and Decisions about Environmental Change

这个项目调查了人们对资源的获取、对风险的感知、信仰和价值观以及与当地的联系如何影响他们对环境变化的决定。具体地说，这项研究使用人种学研究来观察两个洪水风险相似但人口差异很大的城市的居民如何做出关于洪水的决定，以及更广泛的关于环境变化的决定。这项研究将有助于理解这些居住决定可能如何重塑沿海城市的地理位置。这项研究的结果将与有兴趣提高对环境变化的认识，特别是传播其风险的利益攸关方有关。它们也将有助于设计对变化的适应，这可以通过考虑这些微观层面的决定来丰富。这项研究需要跨越两年的比较、纵向的人种学研究。它包括参与者观察和对两个洪水易发社区来自不同社会经济背景的居民的采访。探讨了两个决策问题：第一，居民如何感知居住在经常发生洪水的低洼社区的风险？第二，居民如何做出适应、搬家和留下来的决定，这些过程需要什么？通过对这两个城市的比较，可以调查在两个不同的制度下，应对气候变化的差异有多大。该奖项特别关注三个可变维度：对居民的国家和其他支持，住房存量的耐久性，以及居民对环境变化的意识。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project investigates how people's access to resources, perceptions of risk, beliefs and values, and ties to localities affect their decisions in response to change in their environment. Specifically, this study uses ethnographic research to look at how residents of two cities with similar heightened risks of flooding but very different populations make decisions about flooding and more broadly about environmental change. This research will contribute to understanding how these residential decisions may reshape geographies in coastal cities. Findings of this study will be relevant to stakeholders interested in increasing awareness of environmental change and in particular in communicating its risks. They will be useful also for designing adaptations to change, which can be enriched by taking these micro-level decisions into account.This study entails comparative, longitudinal ethnographic research spanning two years. It involves participant observation and interviews with residents from various socioeconomic backgrounds in two flood-prone neighborhoods. Two decision-making questions are explored: First, how do residents perceive the risks of living in low-lying neighborhoods that flood frequently? Second, how do residents make decisions about adaptation, moving, and staying, and what do these processes entail? Comparison of the two cities allows investigation of how coping with climate change varies greatly in two distinctive regimes. Attention is paid to three variable dimensions in particular: state and other support for residents, the durability of housing stock, and residents' awareness of environmental change.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.