Bringing the Human into Precision Agriculture: What Farmers Need from Decision Support Systems to Meet Economic and Water Quality Goals
Issue
Growth in precision agriculture and data have made it easier than ever to analyze fields for both profit and water quality conservation. Indeed, recent research suggests that management decisions that maximize profit, rather than yield, are often better for water quality. However, despite farmer interest and clear financial and environmental benefits of spatially-targeted management, PA tools have not yet been widely adopted. One explanation is that most decision support systems in agriculture were not designed with farmers’ needs in mind. Specifically, common decision support systems only provide visualizations with limited support for decision-making and were developed with little or no user feedback before and during the design process. Lack of farmer engagement and analysis in the design process lead to products that are not useful for the intended audience. Until end-users are more directly involved in the design process for precision agriculture, tools are likely to fail to meet user needs, resulting in low levels of adoption and implementation.
Objective
The goal of this project is to improve precision agriculture decision support systems by identifying how farmers and farm managers currently use this type of information and data to make management decisions for farm profitability and environmental stewardship. The project will also use the data to refine a new PA tool.
Approach
The research team will achieve this goal by conducting the user research needed to design and develop a decision-support system called Foresite, a scientifically based precision agriculture tool that offers opportunities to increase on-farm profits while improving water quality.
Project Updates
Note: Project reports published on the INRC website are often revised from researchers' original reports to increase consistency.
December 2025
FINAL REPORT
What was the key research question(s) you hoped to answer with your project?
(1) What are the tasks, tools, and people involved in land-management conversion from corn and/or soybeans to diversification practices such as perennial grasses, prairie, pasture, alternative crops, and wetlands?
(2) What are the structural barriers and opportunities available for agricultural landscape diversification?
(3) How are participants currently using Decision Support Systems (DSS)and equipment on their farms? and
(4) How can these findings be translated to agricultural DSS?
The affinity diagraming analysis of our interview data generated several themes in the use of precision agriculture (PA) data and decision support systems (DSS):
We found that PA data and spatial tools enable farmers to identify low-performing or environmentally vulnerable areas of their fields, yet existing DSS often fail to translate this insight into actionable, adoptable change. Farmers rely on layered datasets, long-term experience and informal knowledge networks rather than DSS alone, reflecting gaps in usability, trust and relevance.
Behavioral factors further mediate whether identified opportunities result in action. Insights from nudge theory show that farmers’ decisions are highly sensitive to how information is framed, how much effort is required to act and how uncertain outcomes appear in the moment. Complex paperwork, fragmented program information, opaque timelines and poorly designed digital interfaces impose cognitive and administrative burdens that discourage participation, even when financial incentives are available. Conversely, clear visualizations, simplified workflows, default or recommended options and timely feedback can meaningfully lower these barriers. We found this was particularly impactful for non-operating landowners and farm managers who rely on intermediated information flows.
At the same time, these technical and behavioral constraints operate within a powerful social context. Farmers’ land-use decisions are deeply embedded in community norms, reputational concerns and the culturally reinforced “good farmer” identity. Visible deviations from conventional corn and soybean production, especially during early establishment phases of diversification, carry the risk of social stigma, loss of status or damage to rental relationships. As a result, many farmers engage in impression management: delaying adoption, hiding experimentation in less visible fields or avoiding practices altogether to maintain social legitimacy. Government conservation payments can further complicate this dynamic when they are perceived as “handouts,” in contrast to widely accepted production-oriented subsidies like crop insurance.
Importantly, the synthesis of these findings reveals that barriers to cropland diversification are not rooted in resistance to conservation itself, but in misalignment between tools, policies and social realities. Farmers often express strong environmental values and long-term stewardship goals, yet face structural incentives that reinforce monoculture, behavioral friction that raises perceived risk and social norms that punish visible deviation. Peer networks, alternative reference groups and visible examples of successful diversification can shift norms over time.
Our findings suggest that effective agricultural conservation strategies must move beyond a narrow focus on economic incentives or technical optimization of DSS. Meaningful progress toward water quality improvement and landscape diversification will require user-centered DSS design, simplified and behaviorally informed program delivery and intentional efforts to normalize conservation practices within farming communities. A continued effort to provide both technical tools based on data and advances in scientific understanding will need to be coupled with an educational and operational support network is required to advance Iowa's water quality goals.
This project is completed, but related and ongoing work will be leveraged in a multitude of future projects and events.
Related Activities and Accomplishments
- 5 presentations
- Nowatzke, M., Gao, L., Dorneich, M. C., Heaton, E. A., & VanLoocke, A. (2024). Interviews with farmers from the US corn belt highlight opportunity for improved decision support systems and continued structural barriers to farmland diversification. Precision Agriculture, 25(4), 2058-2081. Other journal articles submitted.
- 3 graduate students and one undergraduate student were supported on this grant.
Leveraged $
This research was leveraged in the funded Grass to Gas USDA project - https://www.news.iastate.edu/news/grant-help-scientists-industry-and-far.... It also supported another proposal still under consideration: Closing the Loop: Coupling Cover Crops and Prairie Biomass for Improved Water Quality in Corn-Soybean Systems - Opportunity Number: USDA-NIFA-AFRI-011134 Opportunity Name: Agriculture and Food Research Initiative Competitive Grants Program Foundational and Applied Science Program.
April 2024
The main activities for this project period were completing preparations for the first of three planned publications from the research supported by the project. The manuscript was successfully submitted in November and is currently under review. Also, a publication plan was created for the other two manuscripts. Updates on those will be in the next report.
Other activities
In addition, two proposals have been submitted that would build on work from this project: 1) USDA-NIFA foundational BNRE program. 2) USDA-NIFA SAS.
August 2023
Most time spent during this period was on manuscript writing. Currently we have three manuscripts in draft for three different respective journals. We met twice during this time to discuss paper progress and input, and will meet again in February 2024. We also presented on the research at an invited oral presentation to a group of 60+ attendees.
Other Activities
- 2 presentation
January 2023
In 2022 we conducted our first round of analysis for the farmer group. In a team of five, we created an affinity diagram in an all-day meeting, organizing individual chunks of relevant data from the interviews into groupings. In total we had 47 groupings from the farmer interviews alone, and transferred the data into Excel sheets in Box. Second round of analysis/ regrouping was conducted in February for a final grouping of twelve themes. During this time we gave two oral conference presentations on the work. In addition, three manuscripts were started near the end of the reporting perio
Other Activities
- 1 presentation
Publications
Gao, L., Nowatzke, M. VanLoocke, A., Heaton, E.,and Dorneich, M. Aug 17- Aug 21., 2023. "Nudging Farmers to Adopt Conservation Practices: Insights on Cropland Diversification" Accepted at American Sociological Association, Philadelphia, PA.
Gao, L., Nowatzke, M. VanLoocke, A., Heaton, E.,and Dorneich, M. Aug 02-Aug 06., 2023. Exploring the Use of Nudge Theory to Facilitate Adoption of Conservation Practices among Farmers: Insights into Land-Use Conversion. Presented at Rural Sociological Society, Burlington, Vermont.
July 2022
Most time spent during this period was on manuscript writing. Currently we have three manuscripts in draft for three different respective journals. We met twice during this time to discuss paper progress and input, and will meet again in February 2023. We also presented on the research at an invited oral presentation to a group of 60+ attendees. Gao, L., Nowatzke, M. VanLoocke, A., Heaton, E.,and Dorneich, M. Aug 17- Aug 21., 2023. "Nudging Farmers to Adopt Conservation Practices: Insights on Cropland Diversification" Accepted at American Sociological Association, Philadelphia, PA. Gao, L., Nowatzke, M. VanLoocke, A., Heaton, E.,and Dorneich, M. Aug 02-Aug 06., 2023. Exploring the Use of Nudge Theory to Facilitate Adoption of Conservation Practices among Farmers: Insights into Land-Use Conversion. Presented at Rural Sociological Society, Burlington, Vermont.
Other Activities
- 2 presentations
Publications
Gao, L., Nowatzke, M. VanLoocke, A., Heaton, E.,and Dorneich, M. "Nudging Farmers to Adopt Conservation Practices: Insights on Cropland Diversification" Gao, L., Nowatzke, M. VanLoocke, A., Heaton, E.,and Dorneich, M. Exploring the Use of Nudge Theory to Facilitate Adoption of Conservation Practices among Farmers: Insights into Land-Use Conversion.
January 2022
Since the last report, our main accomplishment has been conducting 26 interviews with a mix of farmers, farm managers and conservation professionals. These interviews focused on better understanding how conservation is being implemented on the landscape, the decision-making that goes into conservation placement and land use, and how various tools, including precision ag/geospatial technology, play a part. The average interview lasted for just over an hour and audio from the interviews was de-identified and transcribed for analysis.
Using the transcriptions, the team also conducted an initial top-down analysis of the interviews to identify general themes. From the top-down data, individual pieces of seemingly important information were pulled out from the interviews, for a total of 1,762 ‘nuggets’ of information across all three stakeholder groups. From there, researchers planned out how to conduct the affinity diagramming session identified in the original proposal. One affinity diagram was conducted for the farmer group in January 2022, and the other two will be completed in the coming months.
July 2021
Once it did not appear that the Covid-19 pandemic would be ending soon, researchers decided to shift directions from in-person interviews/observations to interviews conducted via Zoom. This allowed moving more rapidly in preparation and planning. During this time, a call-for-participation one-pager was completed and stakeholder groups identified. Tracking documents were created so that persons contacted could be tracked and managed. Researchers strategized which stakeholder groups should be prioritized in recruitment based on initial volume of responses.
A second graduate student was recruited to assist with interviews and data analysis in the following semester. Researchers met several times as a group to discuss, refine and finalize research protocol documents for each stakeholder group given the decision to transition to online interviews. These documents would serve as the basis for guiding and maintaining consistency in the semi-structure interviews. Also discussed were the journals we would like to publish the work in once completed. Last, after every member of the team completed the human-subjects research training, the research plan was submitted to the ISU Internal Review Board, which approved the plan. This was the final step so that interviews can begin in August.
December 2020
This time period mainly consisted of planning and meeting as a group, especially given the uncertainties around Covid. We were primarily waiting on guidance around in-person interviews/observations with our target stakeholder groups, as initially proposed. We hired a graduate student to begin forming interview/observation methodology. While waiting for guidance, we met multiple times to discuss how best to answer our research questions and how we should structure questions depending on the stakeholder group. For example, planning on how to target farmer groups across different operations and sizes and what kind of conservation professionals would be best suited to land-use change questions. To help answer our questions, we also had meetings with outside personnel such as extension faculty for guidance. Lastly, our graduate student began to outline initial research protocols and documentation for planning purposes.