Net Values: Social and Economic Impacts of the Oregon Marine Reserves on the Fishing Communities of Garibaldi, Depoe Bay, and Port Orford.

This qualitative research surveyed fishing communities for their perceptions of social and economic impacts caused by displacement from the Oregon Marine Reserves.

The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s (ODFW) Marine Reserves Program contracted this research to satisfy their legislative mandates, and I also tailored it to satisfy a need expressed by the research communities for accurate representation. To accomplish this, I pioneered a survey method that allowed fishermen to self-select their social values to ground the framings of their perceptions. I then used interdisciplinary theories from social psychology and cultural anthropology to analyze the data. Finally, I hosted a community member-checking event to validate my findings and gather further insight.

This research produced a solo-authored agency report for ODFW to use in the decadal review of their program, and my master's thesis that includes personal reflections on my embeddedness in the research process and my situatedness in its findings.  Additionally, the findings were shared though presentations at the Oregon Chapter of the American Fisheries Society annual conferences, with city councils of the surveyed communities, and in conversation with impacted individuals and the policy-makers who represent them. Finally, the research was also used to create targeted outreach to settle confusion and misperceptions about the policy objectives of the Oregon Marine Reserves.