Conservation agriculture measures as a strategy to create sustainable social and psychological changes in agricultural communities

The main aim of this study was to investigate the potential of encouraging intention to use conservation agriculture technologies to create sustainable social and psychological changes in agricultural communities. The study was carried out using a cross-sectional survey using 384 Iranian landowner farmers as the sample. The research instrument was a researcher-made questionnaire. Furthermore, its validity and reliability were evaluated using different quantitative and qualitative indices. The results revealed that the basic variables of Theory of Planned Behavior including attitude towards conservation agriculture (ACA), subjective norms of conservation agriculture (SNCA), and perceived behavioral control on conservation agriculture (PBCCA) positively and significantly affected the intention towards application of conservation agriculture technologies and practices (IACATP). Comparison of the original and extended versions of Theory of Planned Behavior showed that the inclusion of the variables perceived risk conventional agriculture (PRCA), knowledge about conservation agriculture (KCA), level of education, farm size, and income level in the original Theory of Planned Behavior could increase its explanatory power from 66.4% to 77.3%. This result was one of the most important contributions of the present study that can be considered a turning point for social change interventions in rural and agricultural communities. The study also led to new insights into the mechanisms of encouraging IACATP and social-psychological changes in agricultural communities. These innovative insights can be used by different users such as governmental policy-makers, technology developers, social change interventionists, environmental decision-makers, and researchers. • Conservation agricultural (CA) system is a sustainable production system. • TPB is a suitable model for understanding landowners’ intention to use CA. • Inclusion of two variables PRCA and KCA, in TPB could increase social changes in agricultural communities. • Extended TPB predicts intention to use conservation agriculture better than the original TPB.