Abstract: Based on the field survey data of farmers in southern Xinjiang, the behavior occurrence of farmers’ participation in rural construction cognition was taken as the logical starting point, and the main factors that affected the participation of farmers in rural construction in the border areas from the perspective of development cognition and development ability were analyzed. The results showed that the higher the degree of household part-time employment and the deeper the cognition of the importance of rural construction, the higher the possibility of farmers’ participation in rural construction behavior. The better the family economic level, the higher the satisfaction perception of village development, and the less the awareness of policy, the lower the possibility for the participation of farmers in rural construction behavior. In general, development cognition could drive farmers’ enthusiasm to participate in rural construction more than development ability. Therefore, it was necessary to improve farmers’ awareness and development ability from the aspects of policy publicity and development of cooperative economy.

Key words: rural revitalization, rural construction, development capacity, development cognition, border farmers