Integrating the Human Sciences to Scale Societal Responses to Environmental Change: A Workshop

National Academy Of Sciences, Washington DC

Investigators

Abstract

This project convenes a public workshop of social scientists to examine societal responses to environmental change. The workshop focuses particularly on the ways that societies mitigate the effects of environmental change and adapt to its impacts. The workshop committee is composed of members with diverse expertise in the social sciences, including sociology, anthropology, psychology, economics, and political science. A goal of the workshop is to advance societal capacities for responding to climate change at multiple geographical scales. Members of the workshop draw together diverse insights from the social, behavioral, and cognitive sciences to inform potential societal responses to the compounding and disruptive effects of environmental change and natural disasters. A product of the workshop is a published proceedings, which informs key stakeholders and the broader public of the presentations, discussions, and outcomes of the workshop. This workshop, convened by The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, addresses the ways that social science insights can be leveraged to promote effective societal responses to environmental changes. The workshop highlights case studies, methods, and theory from a diversity of social science perspectives. Committee members address the ways that social and behavioral sciences can be further developed, integrated, and deployed to engender resilient and adaptive communities that can respond capably to the anticipated impacts on social and environmental systems. In considering a diverse range of cases, tools, and social-environmental contexts, the workshop is expected to be relevant to a wide range of critical societal challenges and opportunities posed by climate change at the local, regional, and national levels. The workshop also contributes to broadening participation in science by involving members with diverse orientations and career experiences. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.