Sample Determinations and Research Methods
Local residents are always the most important participants in participative WRM, for they not only offer some key
information related to local natural and social-political system, but also support the measures for solving nonpoint
source pollution (Weber et al., 2003; Wondolleck et al., 2000; Sabatier et al., 2005). Therefore, the residents in the river
basin are regarded as the core interest groups under investigation.
Setting the modules as the target areas, comprehensive methods such as questionnaire, interview with interests
groups and expert consultation were used. The investigation was conducted among residents in the river basin. The
shortcomings of questionnaire were supplement by informal discussions with government departments and interviews
with farmers and single-interest group interview with interest groups such as environmental protection NGO, schools
and sisterhoods. The SPSS13.0 software was used to analyze the results of the questionnaire. The analysis on status quo
of public participation of Haihe river basin integrated the descriptive and inferential analysis, and the analysis on
specific problems was based on the rationality of the questionnaire design. The “2007 National Public Environment
Awareness Investigation Report” was used as the methodology reference. It made quantitative description and analyses
on status quo of environment knowledge level and public participation in Haihe river basin by using descriptive analysis,
and inferred the general characteristics of public participation in Haihe river basin.
We sampled with one ten-thousandth of the population in each target area. The samples of residents in urban
modules and eco-sensitive areas were chosen randomly. The proportion of gender and age structure of the samples
distributed evenly. They have relatively high education background and most of them have their education background
centered above the level of senior high school. The questionnaires for residents in rural modules were conducted in the
form of household interview, thus increasing the residents’ understanding and response rate towards the questionnaire.