Risk as a unifying concept for sustainable food production transitions: Integrating the psychology of risk in interdisciplinary research
Research on sustainability transitions has gained prominence in recent years; one key domain focuses on food production transitions. Dominant agricultural systems and agricultural policy have seen a shifting emphasis from only food security and high yields towards more attention also for sustainable and ecological intensification and the environmental impacts of food production. Mirroring this change, agricultural research has gradually made a similar shift – from research paradigms with a dominant focus on technical (i.e. agronomic) and economic analyses (e.g. during the era of the green revolution), towards more input from social science research that aims to understand farmers’ decision making.
Most research is still constrained by rather strict disciplinary boundaries. In this talk, Marijn argues that in order to get a holistic understanding of farming decisions towards sustainability, it is important to design interdisciplinary research initiatives. Specifically, risk and other behavioral concepts may connect different fields and further interdisciplinarity. In view of this, an integrated framework is proposed that puts risk at the center of studying adoption of sustainable farming practices.
In his talk, Marijn will present several studies that showcase how behavioral research may act as a bridging approach to connect disciplines in studying sustainability transitions.
Tuesday 30 January
9.30am - 11.30am
B.linc Workshop, Lincoln University
A light morning tea will be provided with networking from 9.30am. Presentation begins at 10.00am.
About Our Speaker
Prof. Marijn Poortvliet
Marijn Poortvliet (PhD University of Groningen) is Associate professor environmental risk communication & sustainability transitions, and works at the Section Philosophy, Innovation, Communication & Education at Wageningen University (the Netherlands). Marijn works from a behavioral perspective (the microlevel) and aims to bring in other relevant disciplines (the meso- and macrolevel) to get a full understanding of how decision making emerges. Therefore, he is keen to use multi- and interdisciplinary approaches. Most of Marijn’s work deals with transitions in agriculture, the adoption of sustainable practices, and environmental decision-making. Marijn likes to apply an array of different methods (on the quantitative—qualitative spectrum) and theoretical paradigms. For a full list of his publications see Google Scholar.