Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

A Study Of Sharing And Reciprocity In Grey Parrots (Psittacus Erithacus), Franck Péron, Maria John, Stephanie Sapowicz, Dalila Bovet, Irene M. Pepperberg

Sentience Collection

Demonstrations of nonhuman ability to share resources and reciprocate such sharing seem contingent upon the experimental paradigm used (note Horner et al. in PNAS 108:13847–13851, 2011). Here, such behaviour in Grey parrots (Psittacus erithacus) was tested in two experiments, both designed to avoid possible issues involving apparatus complexity, visible reward options, and physical competition and/or limited communication between subjects. In both studies, two birds, working in dyads, took turns in choosing one of four different coloured cups with differing outcomes: empty (null, nonrewarding), selfish (keeping reward for oneself), share (sharing a divisible reward), or giving (donating reward to other). In …

Comparison Of Recycling Outcomes In Three Types Of Recycling Collection Units, Ashley Andrews, Mary Gregoire, Heather Rasmussen, Gretchen Witowich

Department of Nutrition and Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

Commercial institutions have many factors to consider when implementing an effective recycling program. This study examined the effectiveness of three different types of recycling bins on recycling accuracy by determining the percent weight of recyclable material placed in the recycling bins, comparing the percent weight of recyclable material by type of container used, and examining whether a change in signage increased recycling accuracy. Data were collected over 6 weeks totaling 30 days from 3 different recycling bin types at a Midwest university medical center. Five bin locations for each bin type were used. Bags from these bins were collected, sorted …

Misconceptions In Agriculture: The Role Of Public Relations To Communicate With And Educate The Public, Kimberly Taylor

Journalism

The following study aims to investigate the misconceptions in agricultural communications, why they exist, and what communicators can be doing to further the development, management and assessment of agricultural communication messaging. Agricultural issues are a source of media attention, from policy changes like Proposition 2 or Proposition 37 in California, to commercials such as the Dodge RAM Super Bowl spot in 2013. By studying what professionals are currently doing in the fields of public relations, marketing, and agricultural communications to reach and educate the consumers, it becomes clear the strategies that should be taken when presenting key messaging. This study …

Consumer Evaluation Of Low Sodium Mozzarella Cheese And Development Of A Novel Method For Evaluating Emotions, Lauren Alyse Collinsworth

Master's Theses

Mozzarella cheese is currently the highest consumed cheese in the United States. The popularity of mozzarella cheese is typically attributed to the high consumption rates of pizza cheese and string cheese; both of which are low moisture part skim (LMPS) mozzarella cheese. A single serving of LMPS mozzarella cheese contains approximately 8% of the daily value (DV) for sodium, a mineral which is currently consumed in excess among most Americans. On average, one in three Americans has hypertension. This condition is strongly associated with excessive sodium intake, and it is a leading risk factor for cardiovascular disease and stroke in …

Unconscious Processing Of Unattended Features In Human Visual Cortex, Tatiana Aloi Emmanouil, Philip Burton, Tony Ro

Publications and Research

Unconscious processing has been convincingly demonstrated for task-relevant feature dimensions. However, it is possible that the visual system is capable of more complex unconscious operations, extracting visual features even when they are unattended and task irrelevant. In the current study, we addressed this question by measuring unconscious priming using a task in which human participants attended to a target object's shape while ignoring its color. We measured both behavioral priming effects and priming-related fMRI activations from primes that were unconsciously presented using metacontrast masking. The results showed faster RTs and decreases in fMRI activation only when the primes were identical …

The Santa Clara, 2013-02-28, Santa Clara University

The Santa Clara

No abstract provided.

Overfishing: Economic Policies In Finite Resource Biological Pools, Abdullah Nasser

Undergraduate Economic Review

Common-property fishing is a classic example of the tragedy of the commons. Driven by competition, rational fishermen are forced to overfish to maintain marketplace viability. This shortsighted strategy will lead to the depletion of the common resource pool, and ultimately the destruction of the local fishing industry. In this paper, we present a dynamic differential system of a finite-resource fishing pool to model choices faced by average fishermen. We show that the situation mirrors a Prisonor’s Dilemma on the short- and long-terms, where overfishing is always the dominant Nash equilibrium strategy. Additionally, we use the model to analyze a multitude …

The Santa Clara, 2013-02-21, Santa Clara University

The Santa Clara

No abstract provided.

Implicitly Priming The Social Brain: Failure To Find Neural Effects, Katherine E. Powers, Todd F. Heatherton

Dartmouth Scholarship

Humans have a fundamental need for social relationships. Rejection from social groups is especially detrimental, rendering the ability to detect threats to social relationships and respond in adaptive ways critical. Indeed, previous research has shown that experiencing social rejection alters the processing of subsequent social cues in a variety of socially affiliative and avoidant ways. Because social perception and cognition occurs spontaneously and automatically, detecting threats to social relationships may occur without conscious awareness or control. Here, we investigated the automaticity of social threat detection by examining how implicit primes affect neural responses to social stimuli. However, despite using a …

Rats Acquire Stronger Preference For Flavors Consumed Towards The End Of A High-Fat Meal, Kevin P. Myers

Faculty Journal Articles

Rats learn to prefer flavors associated with postingestive effects of nutrients. The physiological signals underlying this postingestive reward are unknown. We have previously shown that rats readily learn to prefer a flavor that was consumed early in a multi-flavored meal when glucose is infused intragastrically (IG), suggesting rapid postingestive reward onset. The present experiments investigate the timing of postingestive fat reward, by providing distinctive flavors in the first and second halves of meals accompanied by IG fat infusion. Learning stronger preference for the earlier or later flavor would indicate when the rewarding postingestive effects are sensed. Rats consumed sweetened, calorically-dilute …

Application Of Qualitative Behavioural Assessment To Horses During An Endurance Ride, Patricia A. Fleming, Cheree L. Paisley, Anne L. Barnes, Françoise Wemelsfelder

Sentience Collection

Endurance horses are considered subject to a unique set of training and competing pressures due to the long distances travelled. The health and welfare of these horses could be compromised if they have not been adequately trained or are pushed beyond their limits, and there are increasing concerns regarding the capacity of horses to cope with the exercise demands placed on them, with high elimination rates for lameness and metabolic reasons. Veterinary inspections during these rides are important for assessing physiological measures, but the inclusion of behavioural assessments is also warranted. We investigated the application of Qualitative Behavioural Assessment (QBA) …

Inter-Observer Reliability Of Qualitative Behavioural Assessments Of Sheep, Clare Phythian, Eleni Michalopoulou, Jennifer Duncan, Françoise Wemelsfelder

Sentience Collection

Qualitative Behaviour Assessment (QBA) is whole-animal methodology that assesses the expressive qualities of animal demeanour using descriptors such as ‘relaxed’, ‘anxious’ or ‘content’. This study aimed to examine the inter-observer reliability of 12 fixed-list QBA descriptors for sheep that had been generated in a previous Free-Choice Profiling study by experienced animal welfare inspectors, based on the same video footage used in the current study. The 12 QBA terms were scored by two different assessor groups consisting of two veterinary science students and four veterinary surgeons (Group 1), and seven farm assurance inspectors (Group 2). The two assessor groups met and …

The Santa Clara, 2013-02-14, Santa Clara University

The Santa Clara

No abstract provided.

Neutering Dogs: Effects On Joint Disorders And Cancers In Golden Retrievers, Gretel Torres De La Riva, Benjamin L. Hart, Thomas B. Farver, Anita M. Oberbauer, Locksley L. Mcv Messam, Neil H. Willits, Lynette A. Hart

Endocrinology Collection

In contrast to European countries, the overwhelming majority of dogs in the U.S. are neutered (including spaying), usually done before one year of age. Given the importance of gonadal hormones in growth and development, this cultural contrast invites an analysis of the multiple organ systems that may be adversely affected by neutering. Using a single breed-specific dataset, the objective was to examine the variables of gender and age at the time of neutering versus leaving dogs gonadally intact, on all diseases occurring with sufficient frequency for statistical analyses. Given its popularity and vulnerability to various cancers and joint disorders, the …

The Santa Clara, 2013-02-07, Santa Clara University

The Santa Clara

No abstract provided.

Too Much Puff, Not Enough Push? Surf Lifeguard Simulated Cpr Performance, Kevin Moran, Jonathon Webber

International Journal of Aquatic Research and Education

The purpose of this paper is to report on the technical competency of volunteer surf lifeguards to perform CPR on a manikin in light of their lifeguard experience, age, and gender. The CPR skills of surf lifeguards on patrol at the beginning of the 2010-11 summer season were tested on manikins by observation of CPR procedures and electronic recording of compression and ventilation skills. Almost all lifeguards (n=252) made the appropriate initial checks for responsiveness (98%). Compression skills were generally performed accurately with few technical errors (such as incomplete release). Most lifeguards (87%) over-ventilated the lungs (> 600ml) on each …

Proximal Sensing As A Means Of Characterizing Phragmites Australis, Travis Yeik

Department of Geography: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Phragmites australis is an invasive wetland weed found throughout much of the United States. Documenting and mapping the growth and spread of this emergent macrophyte can be an important step in developing and implementing successful management strategies. Characterizing the phenology of a vegetation species with a sensor capable of hyperspectral resolution, positioned at close proximity to the canopy of interest, is often a first step necessary for understanding the basic species-specific reflectance patterns, and for quantifying the manner in which light interacts with the plants comprising particular communities. Spectral data over a P. australis canopy were collected during 22 …

Effect Of Fluctuating Temperatures On The Development Of A Forensically Important Blow Fly, Protophormia Terraenovae (Diptera: Calliphoridae), Jodie-A. Warren, Gail S. Anderson

Faculty Research, Scholarly, and Creative Activity

Experiments were conducted to compare the immature development of Protophormia terraenovae (Robineau-Desvoidy) at fluctuating temperatures of 4-28 and 9-23°C to their mean constant temperature, 16°C. Overall development was fastest at the greater fluctuation and slowest at the constant temperature but showed similar percentages of development time in each stage. The rate summation effect is suspected to have caused this difference in development rate because fluctuations above the mean increase the rate relatively more than temperatures below the mean can lower the rate.

The Santa Clara, 2013-01-31, Santa Clara University

The Santa Clara

No abstract provided.

Pattern Of Social Interactions After Group Integration: A Possibility To Keep Stallions In Group, Sabrina Briefer Freymond, Elodie F. Briefer, Rudolf Von Niederhäusern, Iris Bachmann

Ethology Collection

Horses are often kept in individual stables, rather than in outdoor groups, despite such housing system fulfilling many of their welfare needs, such as the access to social partners. Keeping domestic stallions in outdoor groups would mimic bachelor bands that are found in the wild. Unfortunately, the high level of aggression that unfamiliar stallions display when they first encounter each other discourages owners from keeping them in groups. However, this level of aggression is likely to be particularly important only during group integration, when the dominance hierarchy is being established, whereas relatively low aggression rates have been observed among stable …

Virtual Water, Marianna Khachaturyan, E. Wesley F. Peterson

Cornhusker Economics

Life on earth depends on water. Unfortunately, water resources are not evenly distributed. There are countries with abundant water supplies, such as Brazil or Canada, and countries that lack water resources, such as Egypt or Jordan. Because water is critical for the production of food and other goods, as well as for human consumption, recreation and ecosystem support, competition among the various users for available supplies is often intense. The problem is compounded by the fact that water markets often work imperfectly or are lacking altogether.

What can countries with limited water resources do? In rare cases, it may be …

The Santa Clara, 2013-01-24, Santa Clara University

The Santa Clara

No abstract provided.

Evolutionary Responses To Invasion: Cane Toad Sympatric Fish Show Enhanced Avoidance Learning, Georgina Caller, Culum Brown

Aquaculture Collection

The introduced cane toad (Bufo marinus) poses a major threat to biodiversity due to its lifelong toxicity. Several terrestrial native Australian vertebrates are adapting to the cane toad’s presence and lab trials have demonstrated that repeated exposure to B. marinus can result in learnt avoidance behaviour. Here we investigated whether aversion learning is occurring in aquatic ecosystems by comparing cane toad naı¨ve and sympatric populations of crimson spotted rainbow fish (Melanotaenia duboulayi). The first experiment indicated that fish from the sympatric population had pre-existing aversion to attacking cane toad tadpoles but also showed reduced attacks on native tadpoles. The second …

What Kind Of #Conversation Is Twitter? Mining #Psycholinguistic Cues For Emergency Coordination, Hemant Purohit, Andrew Hampton, Valerie L. Shalin, Amit P. Sheth, John M. Flach, Shreyansh Bhatt

Kno.e.sis Publications

The information overload created by social media messages in emergency situations challenges response organizations to find targeted content and users. We aim to select useful messages by detecting the presence of conversation as an indicator of coordinated citizen action. Using simple linguistic indicators associated with conversation analysis in social science, we model the presence of conversation in the communication landscape of Twitter in a large corpus of 1.5M tweets for various disaster and non-disaster events spanning different periods, lengths of time and varied social significance. Within Replies, Retweets and tweets that mention other Twitter users, we found that domain-independent, linguistic …

Tree Climbing And Human Evolution, Vivek V. Venkataraman, Thomas S. Kraft, Nathaniel J. Dominy

Dartmouth Scholarship

Paleoanthropologists have long argued—often contentiously—about the climbing abilities of early hominins and whether a foot adapted to terrestrial bipedalism constrained regular access to trees. However, some modern humans climb tall trees routinely in pursuit of honey, fruit, and game, often without the aid of tools or support systems. Mortality and morbidity associated with facultative arboreality is expected to favor behaviors and anatomies that facilitate safe and efficient climbing. Here we show that Twa hunter–gatherers use extraordinary ankle dorsiflexion (>45°) during climbing, similar to the degree observed in wild chimpanzees. Although we did not detect a skeletal signature of dorsiflexion …

The Santa Clara, 2013-01-17, Santa Clara University

The Santa Clara

No abstract provided.

Allometric Scaling And Resource Limitations Model Of Tree Heights: Part 1. Model Optimization And Testing Over Continental Usa, Yuli Shi, Sungho Choi, Xiliang Ni, Sangram Ganguly, Gong Zhang, Hieu V. Duong, Michael A. Lefsky, Marc Simard, Sassan S. Saatchi, Shihyan Lee, Wenge Ni-Meister, Shilong Piao, Chunxiang Cao, Ramakrishna R. Nemani, Ranga B. Myneni

Publications and Research

A methodology to generate spatially continuous fields of tree heights with an optimized Allometric Scaling and Resource Limitations (ASRL) model is reported in this first of a multi-part series of articles. Model optimization is performed with the Geoscience Laser Altimeter System (GLAS) waveform data. This methodology is demonstrated by mapping tree heights over forested lands in the continental USA (CONUS) at 1 km spatial resolution. The study area is divided into 841 eco-climatic zones based on three forest types, annual total precipitation classes (30 mm intervals) and annual average temperature classes (2 °C intervals). Three model parameters (area of single …

The Santa Clara, 2013-01-10, Santa Clara University

The Santa Clara

No abstract provided.

Arnold, Andrew (Fa 592), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 592. This paper, titled “Raising Tobacco”, was written by Andrew Arnold for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University. Arnold details the process of raising tobacco from selecting the proper location for the crop to delivering the final product to market. The paper is largely based upon Arnold’s personal interview with Lewisburg, Kentucky farmer, Thomas Nelson.

Long-Term Data For Endemic Frog Genera Reveal Potential Conservation Crisis In The Bale Mountains, Ethiopia, David J. Gower, Roman K. Aberra, Silvia Schwaller, Malcolm J. Largen, Ben Collen, Stephen Spawls, Michele Menegon, Breda M. Zimkus, Rafael O. De Sá, Et Al.

Biology Faculty Publications

Populations of many frogs have declined alarmingly in recent years, placing nearly one third of the > 6,000 species under threat of extinction. Declines have been attributed largely to habitat loss, environmental degradation and/or infectious diseases such as chytridiomycosis. Many frogs undergo dramatic natural population fluctuations such that long-term data are required to determine population trends without undue influence of stochastic factors. We present long-term quantitative data (individuals encountered per person hour of searching) for four monotypic frog genera endemic to an Afromontane region of exceptional importance but growing conservation concern: one endemic to the Ethiopian highlands (Spinophrynoides osgoodi) and three …