Environmental Awareness and Public Support for Protecting and Restoring Puget Sound

Abstract

In an effort to garner consensus around environmental programs, practitioners have attempted to increase awareness about environmental threats and demonstrate the need for action. Nonetheless, how beliefs about the scope and severity of different types of environmental concerns shape support for management interventions are less clear. Using data from a telephone survey of residents of the Puget Sound region of Washington, we investigate how perceptions of the severity of different coastal environmental problems, along with other social factors, affect attitudes about policy options. We find that self-assessed environmental understanding and views about the seriousness of pollution, habitat loss, and salmon declines are only weakly related. Among survey respondents, women, young people, and those who believe pollution threatens Puget Sound are more likely to support policy measures such as increased enforcement and spending on restoration. Conversely, self-identified Republicans and individuals who view current regulations as ineffective tend to oppose governmental actions aimed at protecting and restoring Puget Sound. Support for one policy measure-tax credits for environmentally-friendly business practices-is not significantly affected by political party affiliation. These findings demonstrate that environmental awareness can influence public support for environmental policy tools. However, the nature of particular management interventions and other social forces can have important mitigating effects and need to be considered by practitioners attempting to develop environment-related social indicators and generate consensus around the need for action to address environmental problems.

Resident and user support for urban natural areas restoration practices

“…Significant social factors leading to a positive attitude toward burning included landowners' previous experience, necessary skills and knowledge, risk taking orientation, and subjective norms. Finally, Safford et al (2014) found that awareness, attitude, and socio-demographic variables helped to predict support for resource protection and restoration efforts for Puget Sound in Washington State.…”

Model Assumptions and Analysis of Ecological Awareness and Behaviour: an Empirical Study

“…In the individual dimension, that term refers to individual experiences and the way of thinking about nature, whereas in the collective dimension it refers to the standards of perception, experience, and evaluation of the biosphere. Some authors [22][23][24][25] indicate that environmental awareness is enhanced…”

Developing conservation targets in social-ecological systems

“…Today, Puget Sound is also home to 19 Native American tribes, the Southern Coast Salish, and their culture and communities are tightly linked to the Sound (Thrush 2009). The waters and shorelines of Puget Sound make up a unique estuarine system that is valued for its beauty and ecological importance (Safford et al 2014). Nonetheless, like other marine and estuarine ecosystems, Puget Sound has been affected by a variety of human activities, including agriculture, heavy industry, timber harvest, fishing, and the development of sea ports and residential property.…”

“…Economists, for example, have methods for estimating values of ecosystem components that cannot readily be bought or sold (e.g., Carson et al 2001). Social scientists have used quantitative analysis of communication content (Neuendorf 2002), systematic surveys (Safford et al 2014), and workshops and individual interviews (Donatuto et al 2014) to evaluate preferences. Regardless of approach, the critical aspect of this step is that desirability is assessed for the complete suite of components of the socialecological system.…”

“…Among the participants, 45% identified themselves as Democrats, 15% as Republicans, and 40% as Independents, and all were residents in the Puget Sound region. Once identified, participants were assessed to ensure that the range of included individuals corresponded to the range of environmental awareness of Puget Sound residents generated by Safford et al (2014).…”