Applications of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis in Conservation Research

Posted on March 23, 2018 by Chris Grieves

Post provided by Blal Adem Esmail & Davide Geneletti

Comparing Apples and Oranges

©Ruth Hartnup

In real-life situations, it is far more common for decisions to be based on a comparison between things that can’t be judged on the same standards. Whether you’re choosing a dish or a house or an area to prioritise for conservation you need to weigh up completely different things like cost, size, feasibility, acceptability, and desirability.

Those three examples of decisions differ in terms of complexity – you’d need specific expert knowledge and/or the involvement of other key stakeholders to choose conservation prioritisation areas, but probably not to pick a dish. The bottom line is they all require evaluating different alternatives to achieve the desired goal. This is the essence of multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA). In MCDA the pros and cons of different alternatives are assessed against a number of diverse, yet clearly defined, criteria. Interestingly, the criteria can be expressed in different units, including monetary, biophysical, or simply qualitative terms. Continue reading →

Using Focus Group Discussions in Conservation Research

Posted on March 19, 2018 by Chris Grieves

Post provided by Christina Derrick

Focus Group Discussions: What are They and Why Use Them?

A focus group discussion with local farmers in Trans Mara district, Kenya, carried out by Tobias O. Nyumba (co-author)

To paraphrase Nelson Mandela: ultimately, conservation is about groups of people. On a global scale it’s our collective human footprint that drives habitat destruction and species extinction, and the joint action of large groups that makes positive change. At a smaller scale, groups of people make decisions about conservation policy or management. In turn, communities of people feel the positive or negative effects of these actions, directly or indirectly. From global to local scales, groups of people make changes and groups of people feel the effects of those changes.

To improve conservation action and understand how decisions affect communities on the ground we need to talk to those communities. This is where focus group discussions become an asset to conservation research. They bring participants together in the same place where they can draw from their own personal beliefs and experiences, and those of other group members in a collective discussion. The researcher takes more of a backseat (facilitator) role in focus group discussions compared to interviews, allowing the group conversation to evolve organically. We can get a more holistic view of a situation from this method than from one-on-one interviews alone. Also, as respondents are interviewed at the same time and in the same place, travelling times and costs can be reduced for the researcher. Continue reading →

Resolving Conservation Conflicts: The Nominal Group Technique

Posted on February 16, 2018 by Chris Grieves

Post provided by Jean Hugé

Conservation conflicts are actually conflicts among people with different priorities.

Conservation issues seem to be getting ever more complex and challenging. Practitioners and society at large agree on the need to gather – and somehow use – as much information as possible before making any conservation-related decisions. Talking to all kinds of people, ranging from local villagers, fishermen and hunters to international experts, community leaders and environmentalists, is now common practice in conservation research. Not everyone will agree on the eventual conservation decisions, but the idea is that decisions should only be made after (almost) everyone’s opinion has been heard.

So far so good. The calls for inclusive conservation are being acknowledged, and we should be ready to move on and make better decisions, right? Well, it’s not always that easy. Conservation conflicts are actually conflicts among people with different priorities and values. Just calling for dialogue and hoping that consensus and effective conservation action will just follow isn’t enough. Continue reading →

Using Interviews in Conservation Science Research

Posted on January 30, 2018 by Chris Grieves

Post provided by David Christian Rose

Why Use Interviews in Conservation?

Key herder interviews by Chandrima Home (co-author) in the Upper Spiti Landscape © Kesang Chunit

Conservation interventions need to be implemented on the ground, so a range of people are required to make decisions. Decision-makers can be people like conservation practitioners, policy-makers, and stakeholders who could be affected by an intervention. This usually includes local residents, as well as people who make their living in the area, like fishers, farmers, hunters, and other businesses.

Since decision-making structures are complex and multi-layered, scientific evidence alone is not enough to guide the implementation of a conservation intervention. Researchers need to understand who’s involved in making decisions, who could be affected by the proposed intervention, and gain an appreciation of how local communities use and value their land. Often they’ll also need to find out what local communities think of particular species and habitats. Continue reading →

New Studies Aim to Boost Social Science Methods in Conservation Research

Posted on January 12, 2018 by Chris Grieves

Below is a press release about the Methods Special Feature ‘Qualitative Methods for Eliciting Judgements for Decision Making‘ taken from the University of Exeter.

Scientists have produced a series of papers designed to improve research on conservation and the environment.

A group of researchers have contributed to a Special Feature of the journal Methods in Ecology and Evolution to examine commonly used social science techniques and provide a checklist for scientists to follow.

Traditional conservation biology has been dominated by quantitative data (measured in numbers) but today it frequently relies on qualitative methods such as interviews and focus group discussions. The aim of the special issue is to help researchers decide which techniques are most appropriate for their study, and improve the “methodological rigour” of these techniques. Continue reading →

Issue 9.1: Qualitative Methods for Eliciting Judgements for Decision Making

Posted on January 11, 2018 by Chris Grieves

Issue 9.1 is now online!

Our first issue of 2018, which includes our latest Special Feature – “Qualitative methods for eliciting judgements for decision making” – is now online!

This new Special Feature is a collection of five articles (plus an Editorial from Guest Editors Bill Sutherland, Lynn Dicks, Mark Everard and Davide Geneletti) brings together authors from a range of disciplines (including ecology, human geography, political science, land economy and management) to examine a set of qualitative techniques used in conservation research. They highlight a worrying extent of poor justification and inadequate reporting of qualitative methods in the conservation literature.

As stated by the Guest Editors in their Editorial “these articles constitute a useful resource to facilitate selection and use of some common qualitative methods in conservation science. They provide a guide for inter-disciplinary researchers to gauge the suitability of each technique to their research questions, and serve as a series of checklists for journal editors and reviewers to determine appropriate reporting.”

All of the articles in the ‘Qualitative methods for eliciting judgements for decision making‘ Special Feature are all freely available.
Continue reading →

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