Institute for Land, Water and Society, Charles Sturt University, PO Box 789, Albury, New South Wales 2640, Australia.
J Environ Manage. 2012 Nov 30;111:258-66. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2012.07.015. Epub 2012 Sep 13.
Global climate change modelling has identified south-east Australia as a 'hot spot' for more frequent climatic extremes. Rural landholders may be vulnerable to the risks climate change presents. Australia's rural landholders are considered highly adaptable, with a history of responding to climatic uncertainty and variability. Yet it is possible that some of their adaptations will not be effective in reducing vulnerability, and may have downstream impacts. Rural landholder decision making is complex, and this is one of a limited number of papers examining rural landholder responses to climate change and the factors influencing their decisions. Data were gathered using semi-structured interviews and a mail survey of rural landholders in two districts. Established socio-psychological scales were employed to measure beliefs, values and attitudes that are expected to shape landholder behaviour. Most of the rural landholders surveyed were not climate change 'deniers' with 70% agreeing that the climate is changing and that human activity is a major influence. Climate change was nominated as an influence on six adaptive behaviours by 50% or more of survey respondents. However, there were no significant relationships between belief in climate change and adaptive actions. Personal values and worldviews were found to be the most frequent factors linked to adaptive behaviour. These findings illustrate the complex nature of rural landholder decision making: suggesting that many rural landholders do not need convincing of the existence of climate change; and that efforts to motivate rural landholders to respond to climate change risks should be based on sound knowledge of their values and worldviews.
全球气候变化模型将澳大利亚东南部确定为气候极端事件更频繁发生的“热点”地区。农村土地所有者可能容易受到气候变化带来的风险的影响。澳大利亚的农村土地所有者被认为具有高度的适应性，他们有着应对气候不确定性和变化的历史。然而，他们的一些适应措施可能无法有效降低脆弱性，并且可能会产生下游影响。农村土地所有者的决策是复杂的，这是为数不多的几篇研究农村土地所有者对气候变化的反应以及影响他们决策的因素的论文之一。数据是通过对两个地区的农村土地所有者进行半结构化访谈和邮件调查收集的。采用了成熟的社会心理学量表来衡量那些预计会影响土地所有者行为的信念、价值观和态度。接受调查的农村土地所有者中，大多数不是气候变化“否认者”，有 70%的人认为气候正在发生变化，人类活动是主要影响因素。气候变化被 50%或更多的调查受访者提名对六种适应行为有影响。然而，气候变化的信念与适应行为之间没有显著关系。个人价值观和世界观被发现是与适应行为最频繁相关的因素。这些发现说明了农村土地所有者决策的复杂性：这表明许多农村土地所有者并不需要证明气候变化的存在；为了促使农村土地所有者应对气候变化风险，应该基于对他们价值观和世界观的充分了解。
