This study described and analyzed a rural community during change to determine possible "blocks" and/or "catalysts" in implementing 29 recommendations by the University of Wisconsin Department of Landscape Architecture. Elements and processes which were most highly related to attitudes toward these changes were represented by leaders' community commitments, especially such sociopsychological variables as organizational participation, interaction within the system, personal influence, systematic linkage (significant outside contacts), and earliness of knowledge. The summated rating technique was used to assess attitudes toward six of the 29 recommendations. (These were seen as most important by respondents, mainly for esthetic and recreational reasons, but also for economic and social reasons.) Socioeconomic variables--property investment, education, community tenure, reputational and positional leadership, organizational membership--correlated more strongly with attitude intensity than did the other variables. Thus, although findings depended somewhat on specific variables within each group, the socioeconomic ("base of power") variables were deemed more relevant to the system, and merit greater consideration in social change efforts by extension educators. (LY)