Challenges and opportunities for embedding social science in pesticide resistance research and outreach

Pesticide resistance constitutes a growing management challenge across agricultural systems worldwide, as complex interplays between social, biophysical, and technological factors create wicked problems that resist simple solutions. Transdisciplinary approaches that bring together researchers and practitioners with diverse disciplinary repertoires have been proposed to tackle pesticide resistance but, despite increasing interest, remain sporadic and often ineffective. In many cases this is due to an insufficient involvement of social scientists, misconceptions that better management merely requires more information, and limited appreciation for the diversity of social scientific perspectives. This article addresses this dearth by synthesizing relevant scholarship to show how the social sciences can help to better understand and more effectively manage pesticide resistance. Following an overview of the main theoretical and methodological approaches employed by social scientists, we demonstrate their nuanced practical contributions in herbicide and insecticide resistance management. These cases demonstrate that the crux of pesticide resistance management is context, with no one-size-fits-all solutions. Social scientists can offer a diverse range of distinct perspectives and tools to jointly develop context-specific solutions with biophysical and applied scientists. However, effective transdisciplinarity requires early collaborative problem framing involving all disciplinary partners and meaningful ongoing engagements. The article, therefore, concludes with practical suggestions for how pest management researchers and practitioners can start to connect with social scientists to more holistically address the various aspects that make pesticide resistance management a complex wicked problem. © 2025 The Author(s). Pest Management Science published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Society of Chemical Industry.