Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Is Growing Food Wasting Water? Stories From A Surge Of Groundwater Regulations In California, Abigail Jean Lauten-Scrivner

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This long-form feature story examines how the nascence of California’s new era of groundwater regulation is playing out for the farmers, families and agencies who must adapt to a sweeping new law against the backdrop of climate change.

California became the last state in the west to adopt a statewide management plan for the invaluable natural resource when it first embarked on a path toward groundwater sustainability in 2020. Known as the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), the 20-year plan requires California’s most depleted groundwater basins to become sustainable by 2040.

When SGMA matured in 2020, California’s next drought began …

The Syndemic Landscape: A New Paradigm For Montana Suicide Prevention Grounded In Agricultural Renewal, Emory Chandler Padgett

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Montana has had one of the highest suicide rates in the nation for half a century, and since 2000, it has risen almost 50%. Despite suicide’s alarming persistence in the state, there has been minimal academic study of suicide or mental health specifically in Montana, so this thesis attempts to answer a few questions: Why does Montana have such a high suicide rate? Is there something culturally, historically, or socially unique about Montana that contributes to suicide? Are current prevention efforts helpful, harmful, or lacking? Could a consideration of culture and land benefit an understanding of suicide in Montana? What …

Agricultural Adaptation To Climate Change: How Montana Farmers Make Proactive Changes Despite Unpredictable Conditions, Austin Schuver

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

In Montana, climate change is projected to increase interannual variability and the severity of weather events like drought. To sustain agricultural production, farmers must adapt to climate change within a complex decision-making process responsive to a range of climate and non-climate stressors. This study explores how Montana farmers approach proactive and long-term adaptation, two types of adaptation which are not well studied, but are expected to be increasingly important for adapting to the impacts of climate change. To understand Montana farmers’ approaches to adaptation, I conducted 30 in-depth interviews with farmers across the state. Farmers explained how unpredictability in weather …

Collaborating In Cattle Country: Developing A Collaborative Process To Protect The Ecological, Economic, And Cultural Integrity Of Ranching In The Northern Rockies, Emily Jochem

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This paper explores the creation of a collaborative group that is being convened by Future West, a nonprofit organization based out of Bozeman, MT, to address issues surrounding the loss of ranchlands to alternative land uses in the Northern Rockies. Using literature and theory on collaboration this paper outlines a framework for the development of a collaborative group that includes seven ranchers as advisors to Future West in the development of their program. This framework includes the following elements:

1. A survey that was administered to each participant to assesses their ability to represent their community, and to gauge their initial …

The Effects Humidity & Temperature Has On Dna Contamination During Storage, Samantha L. Ramey

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Studies have been conducted on DNA cross-contamination throughout the criminal investigation process in order to evaluation the possibility that DNA from one sample could potentially influence the outcome of another. However, no published studies have examined the potential for contamination during the storage of genetic evidence after samples have been taken from crime scenes or suspects. This study is a continuation of a preliminary project, which examined storage drying time in relation to cross-contamination. The current study tested temperature and humidity for the potential of cross-contamination during storage prior to extraction. Prior to storage, 50 μl of male saliva was …

Grizzly Bear Attractant Policies In Montana: How Regulations, Recommendations, And Resources Differ Among And Between Recovery Areas, Kenneth J. Edmo

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Edmo, Kenneth, M.S, Autumn 2022 Resource Conservation

Grizzly bear attractant policies in Montana: how regulations, recommendations, and resources differ among and between recovery areas

Chairperson or Co-Chairperson: Alexander L. Metcalf & Chad J. Bishop

Abstract

Grizzly bears (Ursus arctos horribilis) are a keystone species and play an important role in their environment. After near extinction, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service implemented a recovery plan of six recovery zones to increase grizzly populations. Although these efforts allowed grizzly bear numbers to increase, so too have human-grizzly bear conflicts, significantly challenging agencies in charge of bear management. A concern …

Understanding The Underidentification Of Autism In Native American Students, Emily A. Brooke

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

School psychologists are called upon to promote nondiscriminatory practices that ensure equity and fairness for all youth, including racially minoritized students. Despite being overrepresented in almost every other disability category of special education, Native American students nationwide are underrepresented within the category of autism. The current study focuses on factors within educators that might lead to the underidentification of Native American students with autism. In alignment with the cultural humility model, and the tripartite model of multicultural competence embedded within it, the current study explored 36 educators’ attitudes, knowledge, and skills as they relate to the culturally responsive assessment of …

Traversing Paradigms: An Environmental Journey To Body And Mind, Martin Ceja Mejia

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Traumatic life experiences altered the way I perceive the world. As a result, I embark on a journey to reshape my relationship to self, the built and natural world; to environment. In this thesis I ask: How do I want to relate to the environment? Considering I am a doubly colonized agent, I also aim to decolonize my relationship to environment along the process. Therefore, this work aims to formulate a new, personal, relationship to environment through academic literature, history, psychology, Indigenous knowledge and science, and literary studies, among other fields of knowledge. This work is interdisciplinary in nature; life …

Seeding Resilience: An Examination Of The Impacts Of A Seed Saving Network In Western Montana, Christina Leas

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Seed saving, a worldwide practice as old as agriculture, continues even in the context of an increasingly industrialized and globalized agricultural system. While some scholarship has focused on informal seed saving practices that continue to thrive in the global South, few studies have examined the dynamics of these practices in the global North, particularly in the American West. Informal seed saving systems have implications for the resilience of agroecosystems. The concept of resilience has become an important framework for conceptualizing agroecosystems as social-ecological systems, both in scholarship and in policy. However, operationalizing the concept of resilience, particularly in agroecology research, …

In The Shadow Of The Megadrought: Opportunities And Challenges For Addressing Loss And Damage From Climate Change In Chile And Eastern Montana, Usa, Elizabeth Grace Tobey

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

As the impacts of anthropogenic climate change mount, climate- related harms, both economic and non-economic, occur across every inhabited continent and disproportionately affect the world’s most vulnerable people. In response, the Loss and Damage agenda of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change has emerged to address those climate-related harms that exceed human capacities for mitigation and adaptation. Significant questions remain regarding how losses and damages emerge across the globe and how Loss and Damage policy will be implemented to address those impacts. This thesis explores two specific questions: (1) national-level Loss and Damage policy mechanisms; and (2) perceptions …

A Comprehensive Forensic Case Report With The University Of Montana Forensic Anthropology Lab University Of Montana Forensic Case #167, Tyler J. Trettin

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This report consists of an inventory of the skeletal remains of case# 167, assessment of the minimum number of individuals (MNI), a biological profile if possible, and a literature review of the assessment and understanding of ballistic trauma. The skeletal remains are consistent with an MNI of one. The remains are likely from a male individual, and skeletal features are representative of a person of Caucasian ancestry. The individual is estimated to be between of 35-65 years old with an estimated stature of between 5’5” and 5’9”.

Y-Chromosome Dna Extraction From Post-Cranial Skeletal Elements, Mykala D. Ward

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The use of DNA in forensic science has become an integral tool for victim and perpetrator identifications, missing person’s cases, paternity testing, etc. A major use of DNA is in the identification of unknown deceased individuals. With a reported number of individuals well over 8,000 in the United States, improved methods to accurately collect and analyze DNA from modern human bone are needed.

This project took the preliminary steps to improve DNA sampling and extraction methods by analyzing the Y-chromosome DNA yield from the two bone types. While both types are composed of the same materials, cortical bone is the …

Pharmacy-Based Immunization Laws And Adolescent Well-Child Checkup Tradeoffs: Results From The Nis-Teen 2019, Teigan Avery

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Pharmacy-based immunization (PBI) has been heralded as a barrier-reducing way to immunize Americans and reach public health targets. PBI programs vary by state; some states prohibit vaccinating children in pharmacies while others allow pharmacists to prescribe and immunize persons of any age. There is concern that liberal PBI programs may boost vaccination rates at the cost of well-child visits. Parents may see PBI as an alternative to preventive well-check visits at a doctor’s office rather than as a complement, particularly for adolescents. This paper estimates the effect of state vaccination policies on individual adolescent 11–12-year-old well-checks using probit regression for …

Does Having Siblings Affect Caretaking Responses To Infants?, Kaitlin Rose Duskin

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Infant facial cues affect a variety of caretaking-related responses in adults. These effects have primarily been explored as they relate to parental care, however infants receive care from others who are not their parents and it would be important for any caregiver, regardless of parental status, to respond to infant cues effectively. Because siblings often fulfill a caregiver role in the home, this study investigated whether having siblings, younger siblings in particular, influences the way in which adults respond to infant cues. Contrary to my predictions, the findings in this study indicate that having siblings does not influence how rewarding …

Settler Colonialism And White Environmentalism In The 'Uba, Aleena Church

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Settler colonialism continues to shape present injustices of Indigenous Peoples. The settlers of Nevada County do not recognize the historical past of colonialism and how it has changed the Nisenan Tribes relationship to these lands/waters. Or how colonization still thrives in Nevada County through settler relationships with these lands/waters. Settler colonialism is ongoing, it is not an event that happened during the gold rush. I use the South 'Uba River (South Yuba River) as an example for how settler colonialism continues to perpetuate violence and genocide amongst the Nisenan Peoples. As we, settlers, occupy these lands and waters we must …

Resource Access And Equity In Humboldt County (How Social Myth Becomes Social Fact), Colton J. Hubbard

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Rural areas of Northern California have gone without health and social services for decades. The shortcomings of local services have given rise to the idea that there are no services in these rural and isolated communities. Conditions and beliefs have brought up two important questions. The first question is how can access and knowledge of available services be improved in rural areas? The second question is, through what mechanisms do communities develop their facts?

To address the previous questions, I worked with the primary health and social service provider in Humboldt County, CA. We developed a database of local services …

Envisioning A Grassroots Framework For Community-Based Mental Health Crisis Intervention, Xandra C. Gradine

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

The mental health and well-being of both individuals and communities are going to be best served by community-based services and care completely unreliant on traditional top-down models that often include inaccessible services and/or coercive methods. This is especially prevalent in the case of mental health crisis intervention; where most state-based interventions involve coercive agents who often are not given any specific training on mental health crisis response. As mental health crisis and suicide rates continue to rise in the U.S., and even the most well-respected model of crisis intervention has done little to resolve the issues of prisons serving as …

Social Science Research To Help Advance Regional Coordination And Collaboration Of Sea Level Rise Planning And Adaptation On Humboldt Bay, Kristen Orth-Gordinier

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Humboldt Bay is experiencing the fastest rate of relative sea level rise in California and is likely to experience severe sea level rise (SLR) flooding within the next two decades. The Humboldt Bay shoreline is owned and governed by a patchwork of entities with different missions and jurisdictions so coordination of SLR planning will be critical because flooding of hydrologic areas from tidal waters can cross political boundaries. The goal of this project was to conduct social science research that can inform and advance the development of regional coordination and collaboration related to SLR in Humboldt Bay. To do this, …

Does The Thatcher Effect Extend To Infant Faces?, Sarang Jew

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Decades of research on the mechanisms of face processing have demonstrated that humans rely heavily on configural processing strategies when viewing faces. However, this work has been done using almost exclusively adult facial stimuli. More recently, researchers have proposed that infant faces may elicit different neural activity and behavioral responses than adult faces. These observed differences may start at the very early stages of face processing (i.e., the structural encoding occurring within 200ms of seeing a face). However, no studies to date have explored potential differences in processing strategies used for infant faces compared to adult faces. The current study …

A Place Of Small Canoes: An Archaeological Investigation Of Cayucos, California, Kaya E. Wiggins

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Located on the Central Coast, within the northern portion of Estero Bay, Cayucos remains an under-investigated area, and with over 8,000 years of human occupation there, it has the potential to inform about local and regional precontact history. Though relatively few archaeological investigations have occurred in Cayucos, by synthesizing studies in the area, a baseline of information emerges to build upon. This thesis reviews every recorded archaeological site with a precontact component, in the vicinity of Cayucos. These records, along with other relevant studies and theoretical framework, provide clues about the past associated with local settlement, technology, and the environment. …

Comedians Are Leaders: Comedians' Use Of Humor Makes Us Feel Like We Matter, Matthew Burt

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

This research examines funny functions of shared group membership – how content that clearly demarcates ingroup membership may be at the root of humor. Participants in this study listened to a recording of a stand-up comedian who was defined as being either a fellow college/university student (ingroup) or a non-college student (outgroup). Additionally, the audio either contained audience laughter or no audience laughter. Upon finishing the recordings, participants were asked to answer survey questions about their experience with the comedian, rate their overall sense of shared group identity with the comedian, their level of positive affect, distinctiveness from an outgroup, …

Market Surveillance To Support Quality Assurance And Consumer Protection For The Solar Payg Products Market In East And West Africa, Hamidah Naishur Nakimuli

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Off-grid Pay As You Go (PAYG) solar products have become one of the fastest-growing approaches to providing basic electricity services to off-grid households not only in Sub-Saharan Africa but also in many other parts of the world with limited or no access to the grid connection. However, sustainably growing the PAYG solar industry requires paying close attention to product quality from the point of manufacturing to the end user. This research examines how to best design market surveillance programs that ensure quality in off-grid PAYG solar products and strengthen the implementation and enforcement of quality standards in the off-grid solar …

Hormonal Medications And Partner Odor Preferences, Jeffrey Lee Frederick

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

The ability to recognize kin through the olfactory sense has important survival and evolutionary implications when choosing mates. Failing to recognize kin when making a choice of whom to mate with can lead to an increase in detrimental genetic outcomes in offspring. Previous studies have indicated that normally ovulating heterosexual women and men prefer the body odor of those with dissimilar immune systems than those with similar immune systems. The use of hormonal contraceptives has shown a preference for similar immune system odors. The current study examines whether the use of hormonal medications predicts preference for body odor. Importantly, this …

Counter Archives: Unfolding Hidden Stories, Berlin Loa

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

We select what we value as history creating collective memory that can obfuscate or devalue other threads in the story intentionally or unintentionally. Through collections of material culture, curated and described by archivists, we receive information that constructs our collective memory of self. These cultural artifacts reflect and reconstruct the past. Material artifacts in the archives depend largely on the story that is told about their provenance to provide meaning. This paper takes photographic collections in archives as examples of material culture to demonstrate how archival presentation affects the stories of collections items, and examines modalities and subverted stories in …

A Pilot Study Of Total Personal Exposure To Volatile Organic Compounds Among Hispanic Female Domestic Cleaners, Kelly Oyer-Peterson, David Gimeno Ruiz De Porras, Inkyu Han, George L Delclos, Edward G Brooks, Masoud Afshar, Kristina W Whitworth

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Cleaners have an elevated risk for the development or exacerbation of asthma and other respiratory conditions, possibly due to exposure to cleaning products containing volatile organic compounds (VOCs) leading to inflammation and oxidative stress. This pilot study aimed to quantify total personal exposure to VOCs and to assess biomarkers of inflammation and pulmonary oxidative stress in 15 predominantly Hispanic women working as domestic cleaners in San Antonio, Texas, between November 2019 and July 2020. In partnership with a community organization, Domésticas Unidas, recruited women were invited to attend a training session where they were provided 3M 3500 passive organic vapor …

Associations Between Physical Activity And Alcohol Consumption In Rural Cancer Survivors, Scherezade K Mama, Natalia I Heredia, Hannah Johnston, David E Conroy

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

PURPOSE: Rural adults and cancer survivors are more likely to be physically inactive and exceed recommendations for alcohol use. Physical activity and alcohol use are positively associated in adults and cancer survivors but associations between physical activity and alcohol use in rural cancer survivors is unknown. This cross-sectional study explored associations between physical activity, sitting time, and alcohol use in rural cancer survivors.

METHODS: Cancer survivors residing in central Pennsylvania were recruited to the Partnering to Prevent and Control Cancer (PPCC) study and completed mailed questionnaires assessing physical activity (low, moderate, high), sitting time (≥6 hours/day), and alcohol use (0 …

Blood Metabolites Predicting Mild Cognitive Impairment In The Study Of Latinos-Investigation Of Neurocognitive Aging (Hchs/So), Shan He, Einat Granot-Hershkovitz, Ying Zhang, Jan Bressler, Wassim Tarraf, Bing Yu, Tianyi Huang, Donglin Zeng, Sylvia Wassertheil-Smoller, Melissa Lamar, Martha Daviglus, Maria J Marquine, Jianwen Cai, Thomas Mosley, Robert Kaplan, Eric Boerwinkle, Myriam Fornage, Charles Decarli, Bruce Kristal, Hector M Gonzalez, Tamar Sofer

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

INTRODUCTION: Blood metabolomics-based biomarkers may be useful to predict measures of neurocognitive aging.

METHODS: We tested the association between 707 blood metabolites measured in 1451 participants from the Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos (HCHS/SOL), with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and global cognitive change assessed 7 years later. We further used Lasso penalized regression to construct a metabolomics risk score (MRS) that predicts MCI, potentially identifying a different set of metabolites than those discovered in individual-metabolite analysis.

RESULTS: We identified 20 metabolites predicting prevalent MCI and/or global cognitive change. Six of them were novel and 14 were previously reported as …

Enhancing Children's Achievement In Basic Science Using Library Electronic Books: A Case Of Simple Repeated Evaluation, Christian Ugwuanyi Phd

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

The 21^st century classrooms demand a lot from both the teachers and the learners due to the technological developments and demands in teaching and learning. These days, most parents buy their children (smart/android phones, tablets, or laptops without knowing the educational benefits of these gadgets in accessing online learning materials. The 21^st century technology has made the use of e-books very beneficial to the teaming population of learners who have access to the internet, but it is worrisome that there is a dearth of research on such issues in the Nigerian context. Thus, this research examined the effect …

Review Of Manuscripts On “Library Marketing” Published In Library Philosophy And Practice (E-Journal), Ikram Ul Haq, Muhammad Tanveer, Haider Mahmood

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

Objective: The assessment of scholarly communication on the particular area of knowledge has been used frequently by the subject specialists. The current study aimed to observe the coverage of articles on the subject area of “Library Marketing” in one of the library and information science journals, Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal).

Methods: Data search was performed on the Elsevier’s Scopus database on October 10, 2021. The name of the journal was written in the main search box after selecting the “source title” option and in the second search box, “library marketing” was written …

Assessment Of Preschool Librarians’ Library Disciplining Strategies For Effective Use Of Preschool Library, Charity C. Okeke M.Ed, Clara O. Ifelunni Phd, Anthonia N. Ngwoke Phd, Gloria C. Ugwu Phd, Eucharia N. Aye Phd, Chinedu I.O. Okeke Prof, Nnamdi T. Ekeanyanwu Prof, Christian S. Ugwuanyi Phd

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

Effective use of school libraries is very germane in achieving effective teaching and learning at various levels of education. Most importantly, the cultivation of the habit of using library by preschool children at the foundation phase will go a long way in patterning the reading habits of the children as they advance in their education. Currently, most preschool children exhibit unruly traits which are potential threats to effe3ctive management of preschool library. However, literature is scarce on the disciplining practices of the preschool Librarians for effective management of school library. Thus, this study was necessitated to explore the library disciplining …