Integrating the social sciences into ecohydrology: facilitating an interdisciplinary approach to solve issues surrounding water, environment and people

This paper identifies and outlines some issues that need to be addressed in order to integrate the social sciences into the current work on ecohydrology. In an attempt to overcome the gap that currently exists that ecohydrologists have yet to fully deal with the important factor related to people's relationship to water and the surrounding environments the paper emphasizes the need to understand the specific social and cultural dimensions of a given environment in order to define the various and multifaceted relationships people have with the environment. The paper concludes that bringing together concepts and methodologies from the social sciences will facilitate ecohydrology to move forward as a truly integrated science.