| Noxious odor caused by large-scale livestock operations in communities is a growing problem. The current study attempted to measure predictors of annoyance and sources of apathy to long-term noxious livestock odor in a growing western community. A 32-question telephone survey was completed with 719 residents randomly selected from the telephone book. The survey was completed in 14 days by seven trained researchers from the City Planning Office. The percentage of respondents reporting annoyance from the odor was 56%. Individual and situational variables found to significantly predict annoyance were negative affect ( r = .47, p < . 01, R2 = .22), age (r = .30, p < .00, R2 = .19), willingness to pay money (r = .28, p < .00, R2 = .23), income (r = .19, p < .00, R2 = .26), and perceived reputation of the community due to the odor, (r = .10, p =.04, R2 = .01). Adaptation, defined as the perception of the odor as continuing to be annoying regardless of the length of time the respondent has lived in the community, to long-term noxious odor did not occur, F < 1.0. Six percent of respondents reported active coping with a perceived annoying odor. None of the dependent variables (annoyance, age, gender, sex, smoking status, perceived sensitivity to the odor, economic ties to the odor producers, length of time in the community, income, occupation, education level, type of area respondent is "from," physical or psychological reactions perceived to be due to the odor, or perceived impact of the odor on either the reputation or the growth of the city) measured in this study significantly predicted active coping with the odor. Only the reported experience of negative psychological symptoms due to the odor significantly predicted adaptation to the odor (F(1,432) = 5.67, p = .00, R2 = .03) with those who believed they have experienced negative psychological symptoms to be less able to adapt to the odor. Results were interpreted in terms of the eclectic model of theoretical perspectives (Bell et al ., 1996) in the environment-behavior interaction. |
