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Structured Decision Making: Methods, Applications, and Capacity-Building Active

By Eastern Ecological Science Center October 4, 2016

The Challenge: The field of decision analysis is a rich and mature discipline that provides robust methods for helping decision makers understand the nature of their decisions, involve stakeholders and scientists in appropriate steps of the process, and develop transparent records for the public. The use of these structured approaches is emerging in natural resource management, and there is strong demand in our partner agencies for support for their application.

The Science: USGS Patuxent is a leader in developing new methods of decision analysis, and in delivering this expertise to its partner agencies. Working with the USFWS National Conservation Training Center, we offer approximately three workshops per year that seek to solve a dozen real management problems using an SDM approach. In addition, we coordinate and teach five courses at NCTC: Introduction to SDM, Advanced SDM Practicum, SDM:Tools, SDM: Facilitation and Elicitation, and Adaptive Management.

The Future: Working with NCTC, we have developed a professional development and mentoring program to build capacity in SDM. We have set up an exchange program with three labs in Australia that share similar interests, to build the theoretical and applied expertise in both countries. Finally, we have initiated a retrospective study of past applications to develop guidelines for best practices in SDM.

Little Brown Bat with white-nose syndrome Whooping Crane Decision tree illustrating the expected value of perfect information

Below are publications associated with this project.

Decision-making for foot-and-mouth disease control: Objectives matter

Formal decision-analytic methods can be used to frame disease control problems, the first step of which is to define a clear and specific objective. We demonstrate the imperative of framing clearly-defined management objectives in finding optimal control actions for control of disease outbreaks. We illustrate an analysis that can be applied rapidly at the start of an outbreak when there are multip
Authors
William J. M. Probert, Katriona Shea, Christopher J. Fonnesbeck, Michael C. Runge, Tim E. Carpenter, Salome Durr, M. Graeme Garner, Neil Harvey, Mark A. Stevenson, Colleen T. Webb, Marleen Werkman, Michael J. Tildesley, Matthew J. Ferrari
By
Ecosystems Mission Area, Biological Threats and Invasive Species Research Program, Eastern Ecological Science Center

Decision analysis to support development of the Glen Canyon Dam long-term experimental and management plan

The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Bureau of Reclamation, National Park Service, and Argonne National Laboratory, completed a decision analysis to use in the evaluation of alternatives in the Environmental Impact Statement concerning the long-term management of water releases from Glen Canyon Dam and associated management activities. Two primary decision analysis methods, multicri
Authors
Michael C. Runge, Kirk E. LaGory, Kendra Russell, Janet R. Balsom, R. Alan Butler, Lewis G. Coggins,, Katrina A. Grantz, John Hayse, Ihor Hlohowskyj, Josh Korman, James E. May, Daniel J. O'Rourke, Leslie A. Poch, James R. Prairie, Jack C. VanKuiken, Robert A. Van Lonkhuyzen, David R. Varyu, Bruce T. Verhaaren, Thomas D. Veselka, Nicholas T. Williams, Kelsey K. Wuthrich, Charles B. Yackulic, Robert P. Billerbeck, Glen W. Knowles
By
Ecosystems Mission Area, Species Management Research Program, Eastern Ecological Science Center

How much is new information worth? Evaluating the financial benefit of resolving management uncertainty

Conservation decision-makers face a trade-off between spending limited funds on direct management action, or gaining new information in an attempt to improve management performance in the future. Value-of-information analysis can help to resolve this trade-off by evaluating how much management performance could improve if new information was gained. Value-of-information analysis has been used e
Authors
Sean L. Maxwell, Jonathan R. Rhodes, Michael C. Runge, Hugh P. Possingham, Chooi Fei Ng, Eve McDonald Madden
By
Ecosystems Mission Area, Eastern Ecological Science Center

Adaptive management and the value of information: learning via intervention in epidemiology

Optimal intervention for disease outbreaks is often impeded by severe scientific uncertainty. Adaptive management (AM), long-used in natural resource management, is a structured decision-making approach to solving dynamic problems that accounts for the value of resolving uncertainty via real-time evaluation of alternative models. We propose an AM approach to design and evaluate intervention strate
Authors
Katriona Shea, Michael J. Tildesley, Michael C. Runge, Christopher J. Fonnesbeck, Matthew J. Ferrari
By
Ecosystems Mission Area, Eastern Ecological Science Center

A matter of tradeoffs: reintroduction as a multiple objective decision

Decision making in guidance of reintroduction efforts is made challenging by the substantial scientific uncertainty typically involved. However, a less recognized challenge is that the management objectives are often numerous and complex. Decision makers managing reintroduction efforts are often concerned with more than just how to maximize the probability of reintroduction success from a populati
Authors
Sarah J. Converse, Clinton T. Moore, Martin J. Folk, Michael C. Runge
By
Ecosystems Mission Area, Cooperative Research Units, Land Management Research Program

Active adaptive management for reintroduction of an animal population

Captive animals are frequently reintroduced to the wild in the face of uncertainty, but that uncertainty can often be reduced over the course of the reintroduction effort, providing the opportunity for adaptive management. One common uncertainty in reintroductions is the short-term survival rate of released adults (a release cost), an important factor because it can affect whether releasing adults
Authors
Michael C. Runge
By
Ecosystems Mission Area, Eastern Ecological Science Center

Evaluating release alternatives for a long-lived bird species under uncertainty about long-term demographic rates

The release of animals to reestablish an extirpated population is a decision problem that is often attended by considerable uncertainty about the probability of success. Annual releases of captive-reared juvenile Whooping Cranes (Grus americana) were begun in 1993 in central Florida, USA, to establish a breeding, non-migratory population. Over a 12-year period, 286 birds were released, but by 2004
Authors
Clinton T. Moore, Sarah J. Converse, Martin J. Folk, Michael C. Runge, Stephen A. Nesbitt
By
Ecosystems Mission Area, Eastern Ecological Science Center

Below are partners associated with this project.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service