Understanding the Experience of Nonparticipant Private Forest Landowners

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Seeing the Landowner Through the Trees How
Non-participant Private Forest Landowners
Experience Their Land A Phenomenological
Investigation
Miriam L. E. Steiner Davis and Dr. J. Mark
Fly Dept Forestry, Wildlife, and
Fisheries University of Tennessee IUFRO 2004
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Sustaining Private Forests in the Central
Hardwood Region

• Multi-state, multi-school, multi-disciplinary
• Goal
• To sustain private forests by improving forest
  stewardship,
• and to help landowners and society realize
  greater forest benefits
• Initiative for Future Agriculture and Food
  Systems (USDA)

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Background

• Private Forest Landowners (PFLs)
• Majority forest land is in private ownership
• 58 US
• 82 TN
• Provides 50 US timber supply
• Increased pressure on private forest land
• Parcelization and social change

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Previous Research

• Surveys
• Descriptive statistics
• Management objectives
• Value prioritization
• Interest and involvement measures
• Attendance
• Enrollment
• Management plans
• Assistance

Birch 1997, Kuhns et. al. 1998, Snyder and
Broderick 1992
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Previous Research

• Qualitative studies
• Interviews (N 1)
• Focus groups (N 1)
• Active landowners
• Management motivations
• Objectives, and interests

Bliss and Martin, 1988 1989 Kingsley, Brock,
and DeBald 1988
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Surveys major findings

• Most pf land not under active management
• Lack of awareness
• Education
• Assistance programs
• Lack of sustainable practices
• Unanimous importance of non-commodity values

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Interviews major findings

• Internal motivating factors for management,
• Values related to ethical use of forest resources
• Motivations related to ethnic, personal, and
  social identity
• may be more important than external motivators
• Tax and incentive programs
• Technical assistance

Bliss and Martin 1988
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Focus groups major findings

• Extension of personal identity and lifetime
• Valued source of intergenerational continuity
• Enjoyment from activities, setting, exercise, and
  challenge of management
• Perception of resource control is enhanced
• No single dominant reason for owning land
• Sense of well being at least as important as
  economic gain

Kingsley, Brock, and DeBald 1988
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Previous Research Summary

• Time, energy, and money results
• Disconnects and frustration
• Outdated PFL characterizations
• NRPs need to better understand PFLs
• We do not know who they are, what
• motivates them, or how to reach them
• (Best and Wayburn 2001).
• Stagnating research methods

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The Present Study

• Goals
• Objectives
• Research Purpose

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Goals

• Gather information that may not have been
  gathered before using traditional methods
• Focus on and better understand non
  participant PFLs (NP PFLs)
• Under-involved and under-represented
• Majority of PFLs

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Research Purpose

• To describe how non-participant PFLs experience
  their forestland,
• in order to inform the practice of natural
  resource professionals working with PFLs.

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Human Experience and Meaning of Land

• Space and Place
• Phenomenology of special places

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Space

• Undifferentiated geographic world
• Devoid of personal attachment and historical
  familiarity
• Unknown and unfamiliar to the perceiver

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Place

• Space that has become the location of cultural
  meaning
• (List and Brown 1996)
• Distinctive, memorable, affect generating, and
  psychologically owned
• Helps make sense of the world of
• space
• Orients us externally and internally
• Critical to development of personal
• identity and character

?
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Experience of Place Special Places

• Homes and natural settings most frequently
  mentioned
• Descriptions of place tied to the people and
  events experienced there
• Transcend space and time
• Five themes Connection, Security, Possibilities,
  Beauty/Awe, Identity
• Connect to something larger
• Helps answer who am I?

Peacher 1995
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Research Approach

• Phenomenology
• What it is
• How it is useful

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Phenomenology what is it?

• Study of experience
• Existential philosophy
• lived experience
• Husserl, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty
• Method of collecting rich, or thick,
  descriptions to develop patterns and
  relationships of meaning
• Used in sociology, psychology, education,
  nursing, marketing, and others
• Recently used in wildland recreation studies of
  visitor experience

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How is it useful?

• Aspects of experience
• not measured
• unreported
• most salient to study participants
• Populations missed
• Different format and setting
• Particularly useful in any field in which a
  professional consultant seeks to discover the
  wishes and needs of a client

(Pollio, Henley, and Thompson 1997)
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Research Methods

• Study site
• Participants
• Interview
• Analysis

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Emory-Obed WatershedCumberland Plateau

• EPA Surf Your Watershed Watershed Profile
• http//cfpub.epa.gov/surf/huc.cfm?huc_code0601020
  8

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Study Participants

• Deer Lodge and Frankfort
• Phone survey 14 Questions
• management practices
• participation experiences
• 316 Total parcels, 173 PFLs, 50

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Non-participant PFLs (N 18)

• DO NOT
• Have a management plan
• Plan to sell timber
• Conduct activities to maintain the natural beauty
  of the land

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Non-participant PFLs (N 18)

• HAVE NEVER
• Sought advice or assistance
• Participated in a landowner educational event
• Planted trees
• Used chemicals, pesticides, or fertilizers
• Planted food plots or vegetation for wildlife
• Had a timber sale
• Removed unwanted vegetation or animals

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Interview

• Think of two or three experiences that stand out
  for you of a time when you were on your land
• Describe the one that stands out most for you
• Appropriate sample size 6 12
• (Morse 1994, Ray 1994, UT CAPR 2003)
• N 7 / 11

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Analysis

• Transcribe interviews
• Read aloud in a research group
• note meaningful and representative words,
  phrases, metaphors, and descriptions
• must be supported by text
• must be seen by entire group
• Identify common themes across interviews

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Analysis

• Document themes with supporting text
• Verify themes with research group
• Representative of all interviews
• Supported by text
• Verify themes with participants

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Findings and Discussion

• Thematic Analysis
• Language, activities, and management

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Thematic Analysis

• Connection
• Continuity
• Power and Awe

• Peacefulness and Frustration
• Value
• Freedom and Control/Constraint

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1. Connection

• . . . we go back there and share that
  together.
• . . . being close to the river makes it
  special.
• Im more satisfied here than any place Ive ever
  been . . . best thing to bein in heaven
• . . . of course, nobody wants it but me. I
  dont have any children to leave it to . . .
• I like my privacy.

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2. Continuity

• Personal
• . . . The family members all kept comin back
  there.
• . . . I have dug up ferns and brought to the
  house to set out and now I have a grand daughter
  . . . she doesnt live here, . . . she goes out
  and does pretty much what, what Ive done. And
  loves it.

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2. Continuity

• Natural
• . . . theres always something living in those
  dirt piles . . .
• . . . it had pretty much healed itself by the
  time we went back up there.

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3. Power and Awe

• The woodsll make you feel small. You just
  think how long the trees and everythins been
  round, and how long you been round_ How much
  space you take up, how much space they take up_ ,
  hey, most individuals will never make a mark in
  this world, . . . never make a mark on it.
• . . . it was a sad feeling and yet is was, it
  was an awesome feeling to see those big trees
  fall.
• . . . it was a monstrous big tree. . . .
  dwarfed the house totally. . .

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4. Peacefulness and Frustration

• Peacefulness
• . . . it just brings a peacefulness, a joy . .
  . its relaxin.
• . . . a lot of people go to, leave the city to,
  to find solitude and everything well weve got it
  right here.

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4. Peacefulness and Frustration

• Frustration
• . . . dead trees all over the place. Cant
  hardly get through the woods anymore.
• Well, sometimes I think it wouldnt be any of
  these headaches.

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5. Value

• . . . we had different things that we did for
  pastime and that property served a lot of those .
  . .
• Ive been cuttin timber off of it off and on
  swag cuttin I guess you would call it. . . .
  Well, its just another income.
• Extreme joy. A lot of fun and pleasure . . .
  Just from being there.

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6. Freedom and Constraint/Control

• . . . its just like a bird loose when you
  there, . . . youre just free to do . . .
• I dont have to do anything one way or the
  other.

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Summary Thematic Analysis

• Experiencing the land . . .
• Provides, sustains, stabilizes, and solidifies
  connections.
• Answers who am I ?, and where do I belong?.
• Is of value to NP PFLs
• Opportunity to experience and take part in the
  cycles of life.
• Witness the power and awe of nature.

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Summary Thematic Analysis

• The land is . . .
• a nexus for memories
• a physical representation of ties to ancestors
  and future generations
• Place not Space
• Experienced as a Special Place

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• Experience Relationships Among Themes

CONNECTION
PEACEFULNESS AND FRUSTRATION
FREEDOM and CONTROL / CONSTRAINT
POWER AND AWE
VALUE
CONTINUITY
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2. Language, Activities, and Management

• NP PFLs do not consider themselves managers
• Only one NP PFL used management in interview
• Only one NP PFL self identified as managing
  land in phone survey
• Meaning of experiences unrelated to management

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However . . .

• All described activities that could be considered
  management related / management decisions
• Cutting down trees (esp. pine beetle damage)
• Paths, roads, ditches, drainage, fences
• timber sale, cutting timber, quality type
  forest
• NP PFLs may be involved in more management
  related activities than we, or they, may have
  thought

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Implications for Practice and Research

• Management concepts and definitions
• Landowner categorization
• Motivating NP PFLs
• Benefits of phenomenology
• Increased inclusion of NP PFLs

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Management concept and definitions

• Management may be more variegated than
  traditionally conceived of and defined
• Working with NP PFLs may indicate expanding
  definitions, and/or clarifying terms
• NP PFLs may only be as disengaged from management
  activities as we define them to be

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Landowner Categorization

• Experiential themes very similar to
• very active landowners internal motivations
• focus groups responses
• Importance of identity
• Enjoyment of activity
• Enhanced perception of resource control
• Importance of intergenerational continuity
• Importance of non-monetary values
• Yet these are NP PFLs who do not identify with
  management

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Landowner categorization

• How well does activity level relate to
  experience?
• Possible that PFLs exist on two intersecting
  continua rather than a dichotomy
• Land management activity and participation
• Experience, meaning, attachments, sense of place
• Possible that activity categories and figural
  experiences are unrelated

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Motivating NP PFLs

• Capitalize on meaningful aspects of experience
• Intergenerational continuity, peacefulness,
  reverence for nature
• Relate forest management practices to these
  experiences
• Sustainable forestland management
• Sustainable forestland experiences

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Next Steps

• What exactly is management and at what scale is
  it constituted?
• What is it about one group of PFLs that motivates
  them to engage in management activities, while
  others expressing similar sentiments do not?
• Do NRPs have expectations re a relationship
  between management activity levels and levels of
  land attachment?

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Thank You Questions and Comments