Exploring the influence of farmers’ networks and social interactions to sustain soil health management

Introduction Soil health management practices have increasingly been promoted across US agroecosystems to address many interrelated environmental and economic food system challenges. Sustaining soil health management behavior—through farmer’s adoption and continued use of practices—is key to ensuring that these challenges are addressed and also known to be in part influenced by farmers social networks and interactions. Methods Drawing on the diffusion of innovation theories, this grounded theory study explores the influence of networks and social interactions on farmers sustaining soil health management. In-depth interviews were conducted with eight participants of a partnership integrating on-farm experimentation and outreach in the U.S. Midwestern agroecosystem. Results Four interrelated dimensions emerged as influencing sustained soil health management: (1) peer influences and social interactions, including land tenure arrangements, perceived acceptance within farming communities, and farming traditions; (2) co-learning processes that supported collaborative knowledge development; (3) expansion of farmer networks through on-farm experimentation and demonstration activities; and (4) experiential tradeoffs associated with practice implementation. Farmers described how participation in on-farm research increased opportunities for peer exchange, field-day engagement, and knowledge sharing while strengthening confidence in management decisions through trialability. At the same time, participants highlighted barriers to long-term practice use related to social expectations, management challenges, and competing farm priorities. Discussion Our findings emphasize that soil health management practice adoption is not a one-time decision, but rather a dynamic process in part influenced by farmers networks and social interactions. Applying factors such as landowner–tenant relationships, perception of acceptance within specific network groups, farming practices carried out by previous generations, and collaborative construction of soil health knowledge as well as prioritizing social components when designing on-farm approaches to experimentation can help sustain soil health management.