Empathy-Conditioned Conservation: “Walking in the Shoes of Others” as a Conservation Farmer

II. Review of Conservation and Behavioral Literature

Financial interests are the most widely cited account for conservation adoption. This framing presumes a desire for greater profits but may also include other financial attributes including asset growth, risk reduction, and financial liquidity (Chouinard et al. 2008). For instance, Cary and Wilkinson (1997) hypothesized that five factors could explain the planting of trees and deep-rooted grasses on farms in southeastern Australia. The idea that the conservation practice in question must be perceived as economically profitable was argued to be of paramount importance, contending that “the best way to increase the use of conservation practices to overcome land degradation . . . will be to ensure the practices are economically profitable” (Cary and Wilkinson 1997, 20).

Others have focused on cost responsiveness using stated preferences data. For example, Lohr and Park (1995) attempted to determine the cost responsiveness of planting filter strips under the filter strip provision of the CRP among farmers in Michigan and Illinois. Using a contingent valuation (CV) framework, this study focused on whether a respondent would participate in the program, and the percentage of eligible land that would be enrolled in response to a proposed payment. Results of the study indicated that the “payment” variable had a positive and significant effect on the probability of joining the filter strip program.

Cooper and Keim (1996) also used a CV framework in order to determine farmers’ cost responsiveness to five different practices that protect water quality. Incentive payment offers ranging between $35 and $65 would be required to entice 50% of their sample to participate.

These studies find a significant degree of cost responsiveness and downward sloping demand for conservation practices, suggesting that subsidies are likely to yield substantial response. However, models of stated preferences do not always provide good predictors of actual behavior, making it desirable to validate the results with studies using revealed preference data. Lichtenberg (2004) uses survey data from Maryland combined with information on standard unit costs of installing seven soil-conserving and/or runoff-reducing conservation practices as identified by a state cost-sharing program. Latent demand models for each of the seven practices were developed; all exhibit a downward slope, suggesting that cost sharing could have a strong impact.

While the conservation literature is dominated by work citing financial interests, a considerable amount of work shows that other, nonfinancial interests can play a role. For example, a study of Missouri farmers shows that personal factors attributed to the individual farmer may have a substantial impact. In fact, the two most important variables in explaining the number of conservation practices were “either personal characteristics or related to personal characteristics: education and perception of the degree of erosion problem” (Ervin and Ervin 1982, 286). Their findings also suggest that governmental assistance in erosion prone areas probably needs to vary depending upon operator characteristics.

In addition to human capital studies that stress general farmer characteristics like age and education levels, several other studies have analyzed the importance of farmer values and attitudes. Wallace and Clearfield (1997) examined the reasons why producers adopt stewardship practices and determined that many voluntarily install conservation practices because it is the “right thing to do.” Farmers see private ownership not as a right to do what they please, but as a right to be stewards. Also, even when facing difficulties, many agricultural producers have maintained an attitude and ethic that treats farming and ranching as “a way of life,” and not only a venture to maximize profits (Wallace and Clearfield 1997, 4). Notice how these kinds of forces reflect one considering how others may be viewing some matter, and how joining into a kind of shared interest with common cause is a force affecting choice.

Similarly, in a study of the Central Platte River Valley of Nebraska, Supalla (2003) argues that producers have developed a stewardship ethic (i.e., entered into a shared empathy-sympathy with the cause) and are willing to forego profits in order to use best management practices that enhance water quality. In fact, it was discovered that 85% of producers were willing to voluntarily accept lower net returns in exchange for reduced groundwater pollution (Supalla et al. 1995, cited in Supalla 2003, 96). Thus, policy instruments that facilitate expression of this shared ethic may be more likely to increase conservation technology adoption rates than policies that stress only financial incentives.

Maybery, Crase, and Gullifer (2005) also show the importance of values and attitudes. Survey responses from farmers in New South Wales, Australia, showed that producers had three distinct values: economic, conservation, and lifestyle. Also a clear separation existed between economic and conservation values, as well as between economic and lifestyle values. This suggests that “ideologically different policy approaches may have separate pathways of influence within landholder decision making” (p. 68). It can be reasonably inferred that those with strong conservation goals and weak economic goals are unlikely to respond to financial incentives as the only interest. Conversely, those with weak conservation goals are not likely to buy into volunteer conservation practices that sacrifice profits.

As evidenced from these studies, it is clear that farmers can be motivated by both financial and personal/attitudinal considerations that are not directly related to profit or financial capacity. However, as shown by Chouinard et al. (2008), the literature has largely stepped around using a systematic integration of these two types of interests to describe conservation behavior, either by assuming that only profits and/or costs matter, or by adding social and stewardship interests in an ad hoc way. However, a recent subset of the conservation literature has started to use an integrated approach.

The general dual interests framework was first indirectly alluded to in studies of conservation decision making by Lynne, Shonkwiler, and Rola (1988) and Lynne and Rola (1988). Attitudinal data, as well as context variable data including income and farm terrain, were collected from a personal interview survey of farmers in the panhandle of Florida. Results showed that attitudes toward conservation, perception of environmental problems, farm ownership, current profitability, income per effort, and risk were all important in predicting the effort of conservation adoption. This early work evolved with an explicit dual interest flavor by the mid-1990s (see esp. Lynne 1995), with further development throughout the late 1990s, with Lynne and Casey (1998) and Casey and Lynne (1999) testing the model for understanding the adoption of drip irrigation technology by Florida tomato farmers. This framing led to the notion that we perhaps needed to “go beyond” and “transcend” the microeconomics framing as represented in the notion of “meta,” leading to the idea of a “metaeconomics” approach to economic choice more generally, as argued by Lynne (1999). Taking cues from these empirical findings as well as from Sen (1977), Hirschman (1985), and Etzioni (1986), among others, it was proposed that individuals pursue not only a self-interest utility, but also a shared other-interest utility rooted in social norms and the ideas of sympathy, metaranking, and commitment (Sen 1977). Lynne (1999) labled these as “I” and “We” utilities, respectively. This leads to a testable hypothesis suggesting that the addition of the “We” utility to conventional economic models could substantively improve the explanatory power of studies intended to describe conservation behavior. More recently, Chouinard et al. (2008), Sautter et al. (2011), and Bishop, Shumway, and Wandschneider (2010) futher tested the framework. By the time of Sautter et al.’s study, the model had also evolved, moving away from the notion of empathy-altruism to an emphasis on empathy-sympathy as the basis for the other (shared)-interest construct. We now focus special attention in this paper on empathy (and sympathy) as perhaps the missing key in understanding conseration choice.

The theory has also been applied and tested in areas outside of the farmer conservation literature. Kalinowski, Lynne, and Johnson (2006) used the approach and theory to explain recycling behavior. Ovchinnikova et al. (2009) and Czap and Czap (2010) tested it once again, this time in an experimental economics laboratory setting, examining the potental for farmers (student participants in the laboratory) to sell carbon offsets at a reduced price to an environmental organization and, in donating money to an environmetnal organization, thus sacrificing a bit in terms of profits. Predictive capacity of the behavioral models significantly improved with the inclusion of variables that served as proxies for the empathy-sympathy-based, shared other-interest utility.

Chouinard et al. (2008) builds upon this body of research to show that farmers in the Pacific Northwest are willing to trade profits for stewardship activities. They propose that farmers pursue two different kinds of utility, which they label as ego-utility and stewardship-utility, and must reconcile these competing utilities when making conservation choices. This study, too, provides empirical evidence that supports the existence of two interests in farmers. As noted, Bishop, Shumway, and Wandschneider (2010) also applied and tested the framework, using the dual motive model to suggest that the pursuit of joint, dual (private and social) utility impacted the decision to use anaerobic digesters on dairy farms in the Pacific Northwest. The empirical analysis confirms it, concluding that models integrating dual motives into one coherent theory may well be the best way to explain conservation behavior.

In actuality, the trace for this dual interest, dual utility kind of framing goes back much further than that represented in the conservation literature, recent or otherwise. This longer-term history is traced by Lynne (1995; 2006a), pointing especially to “das Adam Smith Problem,” as characterized in a grand debate among German scientists many years ago (also see Smith 1998 for a more contemporary look at the “two faces”). Adam Smith (1759/1790) characterized economic choice as reflecting both self-interest and other (shared)-interest, the latter reflected in the moral sentiments. His famous quote, “Not from the benevolence . . . that we expect our dinner, but from their care for their own interest” (Smith 1776, Book I, Chapter 2) respresents the primary drive. We then find in his other book (Smith 1759/1787, Part I, Section I, Chapter 1), “How selfish soever, man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others.” He then goes on to explain how the latter works to temper and condition the pursuit of the self-interest, through the methaphorical method of the “impartial spectator,” putting oneself in the shoes of others, and asking “How would I wish to be treated?,” which would then lead to a tempering of the self-interest. Similar themes can be found in several key, seminal papers written in more recent years, including those by Sen (1977) and Etzioni (1986, 1988), with literally hundreds of derivative works from these two writings alone. The bottome line is that dual interests theory serves the role of an integrating framework, bringing the many variants on ideas—like subselfs, commitment, moral sentiments, moral dimension, sympathy—under one umbrella. In that sense, it brings little that is new to the table, except the unique integration itself. As Lester (1995, 161) notes, in referring to a similar problem in psychology: “Researchers await a new theorist who will assimilate the old theories and present an integrated theory incorporationg previous concepts and propositions. A cynical colleague of mine once said that such a task requires the services of someone in marketing because the ideas will not be new ones but merely old ones presented in new packaging.” Perhaps this paper is about marketing as much as it is about elaborating an alternative framework.

The dual interests notion is also consistent with findings in research by neuroscientists and evolutionary biologists. There may acutally be a biological basis for dual interests in humans, a case made by Cory (2006a, 2006b) in building upon triune brain theory as developed by evolutionary neuroscientist MacLean (1990). In this approach, it is suggested that the human brain has evolved into a three-level joint and nonseparable, modular structure. The three levels are named the reptilian complex, giving rise to the egoistic-based self-interest; the paleomammalian (or “old mammalian”) complex, giving rise to the empathy-based other (shared)-interest; and the neocortex, which facilitates rational choice in integrating and balancing the egoisitic and empathetic forces. Bishop, Shumway, and Wandschneider (2010) provide a more detailed discusion of this literature, which is also detailed by Lynne (2006a).

Based upon this substantive body of previous work, including original propositions going back at least to Adam Smith, the main hypothesis to be tested is this: Empathy-sympathy works to temper and condition the role of the financial (egoistic-hedonistic sourced) factors at work in influencing the decision to be a conservation farmer. If confirmed, this would provide a substantively different scientific basis for designing conservation policy and programs.

III. Theoretical Framework

We test the proposition that the best way to represent farmer conservation tendencies is to posit joint interest functions, or, if you prefer, joint utility functions, represented in Figure 1, shown mathematically as

[1]

[2]

where d = attributes of industrial inputs and control, nonallocable (which produces the jointness, see Lynne 1988) between the interests; I_G = attributes of conservation practices using conservation tillage as a proxy, also nonallocable between the interests; /_G = t.he interests represented in profit and/or utility associated with the composite production of corn-soybeans-sorghum, the three main commodities in the Blue River watershed; and I_M = the shared interests or utility associated with improved water quality in Tuttle Creek Lake and the environmental effects in the watershed in general. Notice, too, this structure focuses only on the interests and utility within the individual farmer. This is to say, this is not an other-regarding kind of structure; these interests and utilities are not interdependent with the interests and utility of others (for more on the neuroscientific basis for this contention, see Cory 2006a, 2006b; for the details on the formal mathematics associated with the decision structure associated with nonallocability, and true jointness suggested by equations [1] and [2], see Lynne 2006a, 2006b).

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Figure 1

Joint Interests: Relationship between the Farmer’s Pursuit of Self-interest (I_G) on Path 0G and an Internalized Other (Shared)-interest (I_M) on Path 0M, with the Economically Efficient Path 0Z Characterized by Self-sacrifice (Altruism) in Both Domains of Interest

Careful inspection of Figure 1, which represents equations [1] and [2], reveals several substantive differences from the traditional microeconomic framework:

1. Rather than one, there are now two sets of isocurves, one representing the egoistic- hedonistic self-interest (I_G) and one the empathetic-sympathetic other (shared, internalized)-interest (IM).

2. Absolute jointness is represented by the overlap of the two sets; there is an intersection of both interests at every point in the space, as represented at points A, B, and C. In the context of the current study, traditional profitbearing outputs (corn-soybeans-sorghum) are represented in the I_G isocurves, whereas more community/shared outputs (associated with empathy toward improved water quality in Tuttle Creek Lake) are represented in the I_M isocurves. This set of overlapping isocurves also gives the underlying reason and otherwise justifies the shape of the production possibility frontiers (PPF) used by Chouinard et al. (2008) and Bishop, Shumway, and Wandschneider (2010). A PPF curve like this comes from moving along R^oR^o in Figure 1, due to the inherent jointness in marketable and environmental outputs. As we start at the top and move down this capital line, notice how both IG (referred to generally as “profit” in Figure 2) and I_M (referred to generally as “environmental effects” in Figure 2) are increasing until we reach the maximum marketable output at point A. This is depicted by the positive slope toward the top of the PPF in Figure 2. As we continue down the R^oR^o capital budget line, the “profit” declines, while the positive environmental effects increase. Once we go beyond point C (not illustrated in these other papers), both decline, giving positive slope to the bottom of the PPF curve. These positive slope regions of the PPF in Figure 2 are complementary areas: more of both outcomes result from moving toward the competitive zone AC. There is also the potential for synergistic, symbiotic complementarity (see Lynne 2006a, 113, 2006b, 647) in outcomes; notice how the PPF curves move further apart for constant increases in capital. Overall, moving down the R^oR^o path represents the left-to-right movements of Chouinard et al. (2008, Figures 1 and 2) and Bishop, Shumway, and Wandschneider (2010, Figure 1); right-to-left movements in their figures can also be handled with the overlapping isocurves, albeit now the environmental effects are negative, rather than positive. The idea of jointness in the interests gives a sound analytical foundation to the notion of a PPF.

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Figure 2.

Frontiers of Interest Resolved through Self-control on a Higher Plane of Own-interest

3. A farmer is unable to pursue self-interest without simultaneously pursuing shared other-interest. Yet, the tendency within the conservation literature is to treat these choice behaviors as separable, independent effects involving simple trade-offs. This framing fails to see that paths 0G and 0M are interrelated, and, that in fact, most framers will likely move along a path 0Z, which is not about maximization, but rather about finding a satisfactory integration and balance in the interests, “peace-of-mind” as it were. Also, these “trade-offs” are anything but simple, seeing instead a complex mix of subconscious emotions and habits; occasionally and recurring, consciously cognitive calculation; and an ultimate integration and balancing reflected on some emergent path 0Z. The notion that the subconscious emotions temper and condition conscious thought and choice, with said thought also influencing the substance of the subconscious, has been documented in neuroscience research (see, especially, Damasio 2000, with “Descartes’ Error” being that reason and rational choice were somehow separable from the underlying, largely subconscious emotion). This also lends scientific substance to Kahneman’s (2003) claim that economic choice often reflects subtle, subconscious “intuition.”

4. The proposed framework allows for testing traditional presumptions about self-interest; a farmer that moves along path 0G— actually, Homo economicus would move up the vertical axis—and will not be very likely to apply conservation farming.

5. We can also test for the tendency to take the other path, 0M; a person that pursues this path might be characterized as Homo sociologicus, akin to the nature of human behavior presumed in sociology. A farmer portrayed in this fashion is assumed to be motivated primarily by empathetic-sympathetic tendencies leading to interdependent roles and solidarity in a densely networked farming community, while identifying with place and others and buying into conservation norms and traditions in the community. By settling upon point C in the space, a farmer uses many conservation techniques and will use relatively small amounts of industrial inputs. Such farmers are buying into a conservation ethic, being about “feeling with” and being “in sympathy with” (Solomon 2007, 64) other conservation farmers and downstream water users. This also recognizes the need for first identifying with and walking in the same space as others (i.e., empathizing) as a precondition to the evolution of this shared conservation ethic (i.e., joining in shared sympathy with).

6. This formulation proffers that both dispositions must be considered jointly; instead of choosing to maximize a single interest, it is posited that the farmer strives to integrate both interests on path 0Z. This is represented by point B in the space; we might describe this conservation farmer as Homo empathicus, tempering the tendency to maximize entropy (and profit, wealth, which comes from so doing) with empathy/sympathy-based interests, a description suggested by Rifkin (2009, 42) for those who truly contribute to achieving sustainability. Empathy becomes the key in adopting conservation practices and achieving long-term environmental and economic sustainability.

7. Both sets I_G and I_M and the paths 0G and 0M tend to be in the subconscious of the individual and thus not often considered, with path 0M perhaps even deeper in the subcon- scious.Werepresent0Gasonedotandadash, and 0M is represented with two dots and a dash, indicating it is less frequently made explicit. While paths 0G and 0M frame the space within which cognitively conscious, rational economic choice (and overall self-control) is expressed, the two paths themselves have influence through intuition, the kind of intuition described by Kahneman (2003). It is also quite likely that even 0Z, once cognitively considered, may become part of an individual’s intuition, going into the subconscious, and farmers once again act more on habit. This is a major theme woven throughout McCown’s (2005, 22) work; he is building upon the idea of phenomenology in decision making submitted by Schutz and Luckmann (1973), in noting that “in normal routine activity, commitments are made, and action is taken without conscious deliberation” (italics added).

8. It perhaps cannot be emphasized enough that path 0M is likely more subtle, more in the background than path 0G. Another way to state this is that empathy-sympathy gets subtle expression in the underlying institutions (as defined by Bromley [2006] to include norms and traditions, working rules of organizations, and property rules) in the foundation of economic choice and efficiency. We might even say this tendency to empathy and the shared other-interest is latent and needs to be irritated (as Bromley [2006] argues generally about policy change) into attention, such that it might explicitly temper and condition the pursuit of self-interest.

9. This formulation also describes how control and self-control play an important role in decision making. For example, a farmer moving along path 0G will likely use intensive tillage practices in order to help facilitate deeper root penetration, more control over planting dates, and destruction of weeds. In contrast, a person moving along path 0M is more willing to give up some control to the natural ecological system. A farmer on this path is also more likely to give in to more control coming out of regulations or other kinds of external controls (i.e., landlords). It follows that making the role and need for selfcontrol explicit is also an important feature. The preference for less control and the ability to take control also works to temper the selfinterest, in forming the integrated owninterest.

10. Most importantly, this formulation posits the individual farmer engaging in selfsacrifice in both domains of interest, giving a new, expanded meaning to the notion of altruism. By locating at point B, farmers are choosing to sacrifice a bit in both domains: I_G² < I_G³ and I_M² < I_M³ · This is to say, the producers generally need to give up some profit in order to install conservation measures and do the right thing for the environment, yet they also sacrifice some of the positive environmental effects from less-polluted water downstream in order to earn enough profit to remain viable: altruism works in both direc- tions· Recent empirical evidence has shown that conservation farmers operate with such sacrifices· In their study of farmers in the Pacific Northwest, Chouinard et al. (2008) found that producers, on average, are willing to sacrifice $4$52 per acre in order to invest in con- servation· However, these farmers are also sacrificing in the social-utility (shared other-interest) domain in order to make their farming operations profitable· We achieve a kind of peace of mind on path 0Z·

11. Finally, the decision choice comes together in Figure 2, which represents an even higher level of control, this time reflecting self-control in the orientation one takes· We see another set of indifference structures of the same character as illustrated by Chouinard et al. (2008, Figure 2), being tangent to the interests frontier, the latter derived from moving along capital constraint R^oR^o. Chouinard et al. (2008, 73) associate these kinds of indifference relations with the production possibilities frontier between profit and positive environmental effects· We are essentially doing the same thing, although on a higher plane, in that profit is primarily the result of pursuing the self-interest, while positive environmental effects arise from pursuing the other-interest· Thus, those farmers that maximize profits and the utility it can buy would be found at point A· Those who focus on maximizing positive environmental effects shared in the community of interest are found at C· The more intriguing point B, arising from the expression of I₂, reflects the outcome of a farmer applying a kind of “metapreference” (see George [2004] on this matter of higher order preferences that work to “trump” lower- level preferences) that includes both cognitive and emotional as well as financial capability and control considerations (as reflected in Figure 1)· I₂ illustrates a farmer who has moved beyond both mere self-interest and mere other (shared)-interest, reaching a higher plane through expressions of empathy-sympathy· Also, I₂ works to resolve incommensurability in the interests, not requiring that all outcomes be measured in the same (utilitarian, monetary) units· Several years of testing of this framework suggests most, if not all, conservation farmers are at points like B·

IV. Empirical Model: The Demand For Conservation Practices

The demand for conservation practices, most likely being along 0Z, is now represented by

[3]

Standard economic variables are represented in the input prices r and capital/income constraint R; for this study, r_d and r_e are essentially the same for every farmer, due to all farmers having the same input sources, so only R is further considered herein· In addition, the physical context (soil and land characteristics, climate) is N. As Chouinard et al. (2008, 68) argue, with everyone seeking profit, only such variables would explain variation in farmer choices, a hypothesis tested further herein· We also test additional hypothesis, however, due to self-interest IG and the other (shared)-interest I_M not “dropping out” of the demand derivation (see Lynne 2006a, 2006b, for the mathematical argument), which means these interests represented in the utility (or at least a proxy for utility) need to be measured in order to quantify demand. As Kahneman, Wakker, and Sarin (1997) have argued it, we need to return to Bentham, that is, go back to cardinal utility, as demonstrated in the following empirical analysis wherein we use proxies for utility. Also, due to the jointness (overlapping indifference curves) and the role of IM in conditioning choice, and control V reinforcing I_G, we would wish to account for such interactions in the empirical model. As dual interest theory and the metaeconomics framework teach, there are few, if any, independent and separable effects.

The ultimate goal of this research is to use the information and insights gained in order to encourage and perhaps “nudge” (in the spirit of Thaler and Sunstein [2008], who frame the notion of nudging in a kind of “li-betarian paternalism”) behavioral change in the use of conservation measures. Models that are probabilistic in nature are best suited to this task, with the nudging focused on increasing the odds of adopting conservation technologies, with particular focus on tillage strategies. Therefore, a logit version of equation [3] is used, with four logit models of the following functional forms considered:

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7]

where X₁ = 1 if any amount of conservation tillage is used on the farm, and 0 represents a farmer that used only reduced and/or conventional tillage; Ri = the income (as a proxy for financial capacity) of the ith farmer; N¡ = the physical characteristics of the ith farmer’s crop land; I_Gi = proxy for self-interest of the ith farmer; I_Mi = proxy for the shared other- interest of the ith farmer; H_i = proxy for habitual tendencies of the ith farmer; and Vi = proxy for preference for control by ith farmer. Notice that equation [4] represents the standard demand equation based in microeconomics when input prices do not vary (which is the case for this sample of farmers), whereas equation [5] represents the demand equation offered by dual interests, metaeconomic theory, making the role of empathy in choice decisions explicit. Equations [6] and [7] further elaborate the dual interests model by adding variables that account for habitual tendencies and preferences for control exhibited by the individual farmer.

VI. Contributions of this Work

The approach guiding this study uses much of the familiar analytical machinery from microeconomics. In fact, if none of the statistical tests related to dual interests show explanatory power, the framework reverts to supporting the notion that farmers maximize self-interest only. This would suggest the need to maintain the historical focus on financial and technical assistance. Alternatively, if further statistical testing continues to produce support for the role of empathy-sympathy tempering self-interest, as found in this study, then a substantively different kind of conservation policy and programming is needed. All the implications revolve around the empathysympathy phenomenon.