BE-29 :: Mind shift and change in behavior

Having the “right” knowledge and practices is not enough to challenge the needed change. A mind shift and change in behavior -at the level of all stakeholders- are required.
Social sciences should unveil the triggers needed to provoke change. This, however, demands technical knowledge of the soil and land use system in the bigger framework to be fully comprehensible. You must know the process in order to know how things must be changed. The relevant information/knowledge should be disseminated to the stakeholders in order that they know why a change in mind and behavior is appropriate or needed. The added value of change for all stakeholders and society needs to be clarified and clearly and visually communicated.
The importance of pioneers (actors who seek to own initiative for alternatives) is very clear and should not be ignored here. Based on their own new ideas or vision, they take new (in the beginning) individual initiatives and could be new “leaders” who can share their ideas to colleagues.
Research questions:
Process related item and relevant to all four integrative themes.
How can we encourage the citizens/farmers/politicians/… to change/adjust his/their mindset and behavior so that something can change? For example: how to change the conventional agricultural methods into alternative methods (e.g. no tillage) ? E.g. by helping to change farmers’ perception on soil => soil is a partner that the farmer should treat as such.
How to support pioneers in transition behavior or mind shift?
Applied Agent Based Modeling: how can farmers make the right choices? Therefore they need the right information. How to model the farmers’ behavior in relation to different constraints (e.g. market prices, …) and the different related scenarios and costs?