| Abstract: | ABSTRACT. Opinion or attitude surveys and observations of people's actions are complementary research tools, but they often provide different results. This was the case where two communities, one rural, one suburban, made waste water management decisions which would promote population growth while survey data indicated that community attitudes were neutral or slightly opposed to population growth. Observation of action, and expanding the range of survey response variation revealed that the structure of both community opinion and action was primarily influenced by small groups of people with very strong feelings favoring and disfavoring population growth. Those with very strong feelings were the ones observed to be acting to promote or retard growth. |
