Grounded Values: An Exploration of Soil Ethics in Puerto Rican Coffee Farmers

This research study will follow a mixed methods embedded design in which the qualitative data will enhance the quantitative results (Creswell & Plan-Clark, 2007). This study aims to examine coffee farmers’ values, beliefs, and norms regarding soil conservation and their relationship to motivation to adopt soil conservation practices in Puerto Rico. The theoretical and conceptual framework for this study is the values-beliefs-norms theory developed by Stern et al. (1999).  

A survey instrument will be distributed to participants, and key-informant interviews will be conducted with a subsample of the survey participants to gain a deeper understanding of the ethical considerations made by coffee farmers regarding soil conservation. This study will be evaluated by two Institutional Review Boards (IRB), first by Mississippi State University and then by the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez, also an 1862 land-grant institution. The Agricultural Extension Service in Puerto Rico is affiliated with the College of Agricultural Sciences, a part of the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez, and thus IRB is also required by this institution.  

The target population for this study consists of coffee farmers in the coffee-producing region of Puerto Rico, including specific municipalities where coffee is the primary agricultural commodity. According to the 2018 Census of Agriculture, there were 2,195 coffee farms in this region. Recruitment strategies include social media, email lists, online communities, farm visits, and word-of-mouth from local Extension agents in the Agricultural Extension Service in Puerto Rico.  

In this mixed-methods study, coffee farmers’ values, beliefs, and norms are the predictor variables, and motivation to adopt soil conservation practices is the criterion variable. Quantitative data will be collected through a single questionnaire distributed online and in person (through farm visits), with assistance from the Agricultural Extension Service in Puerto Rico.  

The survey for this project will be adapted from the work of Rezaei-Moghaddam et al. (2020) and Euse-Villa et al. (2021) and will consist of five sections. The first section will address farmers’ values and will include statements regarding egoistic and biospheric values. The second section will address farmers’ beliefs and will include statements about ecological worldview, awareness of consequences, and ascription of responsibility. The third section will address the personal and social norms of farmers. The fourth section will address farmers’ adoption of conservation practices as a pro-environmental behavior. The fifth and final section will collect demographic information.  

Survey participation will be voluntary and incentivized by free optometric services and registration to the one-day soil conservation workshop that will serve as the project's main outreach effort. Offering free optometric services as incentives for survey participants will address a healthcare need within the community by facilitating access to eyecare treatments that may not be available otherwise. The effort enhances the well-being of the community and encourages the cultivation of strong and trustworthy relationships between the researchers and the participants.

The questionnaire will be available in both English and Spanish. Ms. Cordero-Irizarry will translate the responses because she is Puerto Rican and is a native Spanish speaker. To ensure validity, the questionnaire will be pre-tested with experts to ensure clarity and relevance. Cronbach’s alpha will be used to establish reliability. To address research objective 1, descriptive statistics, multiple linear regression, and logistic regression analyses will be conducted in Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS).  

Qualitative data will be collected through semi-structured interviews with 15-20 farmers who completed the questionnaire to explore the ethical personal norms motivating soil conservation efforts. Participation in the interviews will also be voluntary. Four criteria will be used to judge the quality of the qualitative data: confirmability, dependability, credibility, and transferability (Cope, 2014). These criteria will be attained through a clear description of the research procedures, tracking and documenting changes, and a four-member committee examination of the findings. To address research objective 2, hematic analysis will be conducted to identify commonalities among participants' perceptions of soil conservation using the following steps: (1) familiarization with the data, (2) coding, (3) searching for themes, (4) reviewing themes, (5) defining and naming themes, and (6) writing the report (Braun & Clarke, 2006).  

Findings will be disseminated in a one-day soil conservation outreach workshop developed, implemented, and evaluated with the Agricultural Extension Service in Puerto Rico. To address research objective 2, a paired t-test analysis will be conducted for the evaluation pre-and-post surveys pertaining to the one-day soil conservation outreach program. Additional dissemination efforts will include oral presentations at the Spring 2025 Graduate Student Research Symposium at Mississippi State University and the 2026 Soil and Water Conservation Annual Conference, an Extension publication, and two journal articles.