How Actor-Network Theory Does Not Apply to Human-Environmental Interaction

                Sociologists always try to make the most sense of interaction, but they have gone too far with Actor-Network Theory.  Actor-Network Theory is a unique sociological view that connects humans and non-humans (including objects) into a massive network of what influences what.  However, Actor-Network Theory (ANT) is much criticized and likened to an actual ant, because it fails to explain why relations are and simplifies complex relationships down to just the direct influences.

When analyzing the environment with Actor-Network Theory, trees and humans would have an unclear relationship.  Someone utilizing Actor-Network Theory could tell that trees and humans interact, but ANT does not account for the numerous ways in which they influence each other.  Without more context, one might believe that trees victimize humans, that trees and humans lead a balanced, peaceful existence or that trees are reliant on humans.  However none of these accurately portray their relationship and this is what Actor-Network Theory misses.  In the aptly-named article, On the Use of Actor-Network Theory for Developing Web Services Dedicated to Communities of Practice, an actor is described as “characterized first hand by its capability to act and interact, its influence.”  Trees do not do much direct influencing on their own; even when trees are influenced themselves, such as by humans, the cause for interaction is not important to ANT.

Actor-Network Theory would acknowledge that 17^th century Portuguese sailors interacted with Dodo birds and used them for food, but not tell us that the sailors and their animals hunted Dodos to extinction. Knowing that a relationship exists is practically useless without knowing its nature.  Alone, the fact that Portuguese sailors ate Dodo birds is insignificant; what is more important is the long-term biological implications on Earth’s biodiversity. 

                What’s worse, ANT misses another facet of interaction: power.  An Actor-Network Theory analysis would not distinguish between the capabilities of trees and people.  ANT might tell us that we rely on trees for our existence but would miss how humans exhibit power over trees by destroying them.  That seems pretty important, that the relationship may extinguish or change its members, but ANT does not value that information. 

Actor-Network Theory is even less effective in the Environment-Human network because roles are constantly changing.  The position of humans relative to the environment, and vice versa, are always adapting.  The ideas people hold about nature (yet another “actor”) also change and that influences the relation humans and the environment have.

• The Tragedy of the Dodo, http://www.davidreilly.com/dodo/
• Actor-Network Theory, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actor-network_theory
• On the Use of Actor-Network Theory for Developing Web Services Dedicated to Communities of Practice, http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.86.8144&rep=rep1&type=pdf

Satisfying Volunteers Expectations

What makes people volunteer to help the environment?  The obvious answer is “because they care about nature.”  Realistically, this is a no more than a romanticized notion and assumes that people’s concern for the natural world provide them with enough drive to leave their couch.  I explored practical ways in which I could actually get people to come to and continue to attend meetings for our group project. 

            First and foremost, once our group has organized and chose public meeting times, there must be refreshments.  Believe it or not, food is a huge incentive for college kids to attend meetings and a nice reward for everyone to enjoy.  Having food to eat at the end of a meeting also facilitates social interaction between members.  Part of this portrays expectancy theory, people often expect food as reward for their time and service; but this also fills Maslow’s third tier in the hierarchy of needs.  It is safe to assume that most people who are volunteering have free time, and don’t have to worry about having food or feeling safe and sheltered (the first two levels).  The third layer of Maslow’s needs is belonging, or friendship.  Besides food to share, there are other ways we could make our group’s new members feeling comfortable and accepted; feeling like a part of the group is key to keep people wanting to return.  One way to accomplish this is to play a “name game” at the beginning of meetings to help members learn each other’s names, and therefore increase comfort and interaction. 

            Another way to motivate people to volunteer is to make the project seem important.  A big factor in convincing people to volunteer is recognition, or social gratification.   This boils down to having something to show off once you have volunteered.   Our group could organize to plant trees or to build birdhouses.  For our first meeting, I am considering contacting the local press; having a reporter write and publish a short article about Glassboro’s up-and-coming environmental activism group would be great publicity, and incentive for the public to come join.  The same motivation (and group pride) could also come from a vendor fair highlighting eco-friendly businesses, services and products locally. Fun, personal enjoyment, would act as a major motivation if the right message were sent to potential members.

            We could also host friendly competition within our volunteerism.  Bird counting could be made into contest, seeing who could identify the most species in the time allotted.  The prize would be negligible, something like Spit Balls (which are fun to play with but also a useful for planting) or a simple group acknowledgement. This kind of contest highlights expectancy theory well, that people will do something with the expectation of an appropriate reward. 

            A simpler form of incentive, which would also excellent for team building, would be to give members matching T-shirts or caps.  It would build unity within but also entice outsiders with the promise of belonging (Maslow’s Third Level) or material gain.  We would certainly be a sharp-looking group in our Courier-Post cover shot.

• Courier-Post newspaper http://www.courierpostonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?category=towns12&county=glouco&tcode=13838
• Spit Balls http://www.scientificsonline.com/polymer-spit-balls.html
• Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs http://psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/a/hierarchyneeds.htm
• Expectancy Theory http://www.uri.edu/research/lrc/scholl/webnotes/Motivation_Expectancy.htm

Creating a Dynamic Project Group

We have all worked on a group project and found that your group could not accomplish an objective as efficiently as possible.  Sometimes the problem is that your group-mates cannot agree on a basic part of the project. Other times a problem stems from members who take too many creative liberties or those who are not willing to take any at all.  Some members fail to contribute because they do not see a reason to.  As they are, these individuals would make a weak team. However, if we balance each of these people’s mannerisms to highlight their strengths, we can create ideal teams for completing a project, such as our class’s final group project.

My first experience with teams built around their members’ personal traits came in the fall of my freshman year.  Composition I professor, the now-retired Dr. Donald Stoll, utilized these attributes, which he saw as learning patterns, to combine me and my peers into efficient teams.  He used an online service called Learning Connections Inventory to gauge each individual’s stronger patterns.  Students at Rowan all have access to this test for free through their Rowan Self-Service accounts.  The Learning Connections Inventory, LCI for short, examines four learning patterns: Precise, Sequential, Technical Reasoning, and Confluent.  Precise patterns value accuracy and want to know exactly what is going on, Sequential patterns seek order and consistency, Technical patterns desire practicality and independence, and Confluent patterns rely on intuition and do not like to follow rules. Though we all use each pattern, most people have one or two that they utilize most.

It is easy to visualize how a team of Sequential people could argue about each other’s methods and take too long planning and not enough time acting.  A Precise team would likely pay too much attention to details on step one and never produce a product in time.  A team of Technical individuals might not want to work together at all.  Confluent people would fail to follow rules and create something that does not fit the criteria. 

However, all of these patterns have comparable strengths in their own right.  Sequential people are good at planning and keeping Confluent members in line; Precise members will raise important questions and add details that Technical members might find unimportant; Technical individuals would find practical application for your project and would examine purpose where Sequential people would otherwise blindly accept parts of a process; finally, Confluent people bring a different perspective to work and could draw Precise members away from detail to keep a steady rate of progress.

In short, a strong team is composed of members who dominate in each of the four different learning patterns. But what about LCI makes it more valuable than a Meyers-Briggs test?  I found the answer to this question as a direct result of my own confluence.  While scrolling down the Let Me Learn webpage (letmelearn.org), the organization that created the LCI, my eye caught their headquarters address.  It is in Glassboro!  With only 45 minutes before my next class started, I quickly recruited my friend Alex and his car to take me to Let Me Learn’s headquarters.  We arrived in no-time at Let Me Learn Inc. where we met Executive Director Joel Johnston.  He described to us how a person’s personality is much more fickle than their learning pattern.  We also discussed how each pattern manifests itself in people and what they would bring to a group. 

After our discussion with one of Learning Connections Inventory’s creators, it was evident that this would be an easy way to maximize our class’s potential for creating an outstanding project.  Every Rowan student already has LCI results available online in their Rowan Self-Service account!  I propose we use LCIs to chose groups in class, and judge how effectively our groups function to accomplish our objective. This practice would be effective outside of the classroom as well, employers would be able to better allot jobs and create teams for jobs if they know the learning patterns of their employees.

• http://www.letmelearn.org/

• Developing Metacognitive Engineering Teams by James Newell, Kevin Dahm, Roberta Harvey, and Heidi Newell of Rowan University http://www.rowan.edu/colleges/engineering/clinics/asee/papers/2004/3213-newell.pdf
• A Teambuilding Model for the Educational Leadership Classroom by Patricia Ann Marcellino of Adelphi University
  http://www.letmelearn.org/wp-content/uploads/a_teambuilding_model_for_the_educational_leadership_classroom.pdf
• Personal Interviews with Joel Johnston and Dr. Donald Stoll on LCI