Ecology

Now showing 1 - 3 of 3

A hypothetico‐deductive theory of science and learning
(Wiley, 2023-08) Kalinowski, Steven T.; Pelakh, Avital
This article presents a simple, cognitive theory of science and learning. The first section of the paper develops the theory's two main propositions: (i) A wide range of scientific activities rely heavily on one type of reasoning, hypothetical thinking, and (ii) This type of reasoning is also useful to students for learning science content. The second section of the paper presents a taxonomy of multiple‐choice questions that use hypothetical thinking and the third section of the paper tests the theory using data from a college biology course. As expected by the theory, student responses to 24 scientific reasoning questions were consistent with a one‐dimensional psychometric construct. Student responses to the scientific reasoning questions explained 36% of the variance in exam grades. Several directions for additional research are identified, including studying the psychometric structure of scientific thinking in more detail, performing randomized, controlled experiments to demonstrate a causal relationship between scientific thinking and learning, and identifying the relative contribution of other factors to success in college.
Evidence of an Absence of Inbreeding Depression in a Wild Population of Weddell Seals (Leptonychotes weddellii)
(MDPI AG, 2023-02) Powell, John H.; Kalinowski, Steven T.; Taper, Mark L.; Rotella, Jay J.; Davis, Corey S.; Garrott, Robert A.
Inbreeding depression can reduce the viability of wild populations. Detecting inbreeding depression in the wild is difficult; developing accurate estimates of inbreeding can be time and labor intensive. In this study, we used a two-step modeling procedure to incorporate uncertainty inherent in estimating individual inbreeding coefficients from multilocus genotypes into estimates of inbreeding depression in a population of Weddell seals (Leptonychotes weddellii). The two-step modeling procedure presented in this paper provides a method for estimating the magnitude of a known source of error, which is assumed absent in classic regression models, and incorporating this error into inferences about inbreeding depression. The method is essentially an errors-in-variables regression with non-normal errors in both the dependent and independent variables. These models, therefore, allow for a better evaluation of the uncertainty surrounding the biological importance of inbreeding depression in non-pedigreed wild populations. For this study we genotyped 154 adult female seals from the population in Erebus Bay, Antarctica, at 29 microsatellite loci, 12 of which are novel. We used a statistical evidence approach to inference rather than hypothesis testing because the discovery of both low and high levels of inbreeding are of scientific interest. We found evidence for an absence of inbreeding depression in lifetime reproductive success, adult survival, age at maturity, and the reproductive interval of female seals in this population.
Performance of Juvenile Cutthroat Trout Translocated as Embryos from Five Populations into a Common Habitat
(2016-07) Andrews, Tessa; Shepard, Bradley B.; Litt, Andrea R.; Kruse, Carter G.; Nelson, M. Lee; Clancey, Patrick; Zale, Alexander V.; Taper, Mark L.; Kalinowski, Steven T.
The distributions of most native trout species in western North America have been severely reduced, and conservation of many of these species will require translocation into vacant habitats following removal of nonnative species. A critical question managers have is \Does it matter which donor sources are used for these translocations?\" We present a case study that addressed this question for a large native trout translocation project in Montana. We introduced embryos from five source populations of Westslope Cutthroat Trout Oncorhynchus clarkii lewisi to a large, fishless watershed in Montana following removal of nonnative fish with piscicides. Source populations providing embryos for translocations were three nearby (< 120 km) wild populations, the state of Montana\'s captive Westslope Cutthroat Trout hatchery conservation population (initiated 32 years ago using fish from wild populations located > 350 km from the translocation site), and a population in captivity for one generation comprised of individuals from the three wild populations used as single sources for this project, which were variably crossed (59% within populations and 41% between populations) to provide embryos. We used remote-site incubators at six different sites to introduce approximately 35,000 embryos from 400 genotyped parents. We later resampled and genotyped 1,450 of these individuals at age 1 and age 2. Juvenile survival for the more genetically diverse Montana Westslope Cutthroat Trout conservation population was twice as high as for other source populations, even though these other source populations were geographically closer to the translocation site than populations used to make the Montana Westslope Cutthroat Trout conservation population. Body weight for progeny from the two captive populations was higher than for progeny from wild source populations, and some differences were observed in body condition among source populations. Continued monitoring over several generations will be necessary to determine the eventual contributions of each source population and the relevance of these initial findings."

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