Scholarship & Research
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Item Prairie gothic(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 2024) Hedge, Kristen Marie; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Jeremy HatchPrairie Gothic is my understanding of how I have been shaped by experiences of grief and mourning, informed by aesthetics of the Midwest and Western landscape. My research is based on mourning adornment and dress from the Victorian period (approx. 1820-1914), and its impact on Midwest and Western American culture from the perspective of the working class. As the customs surrounding mourning were extravagant in every way, the typical working-class person could not afford to express their love and mourn with gold, diamonds and silk. The objects I have come across in my research express a kind of sentimentality that allows people to express and contain their grief in these objects as a form of art. Everyday materials that are typically overlooked can become reliquaries containing memories and information about the deceased. It is these materials that I used in my work to highlight the importance of family and love.Item Investigating working memory capacity in an online nature intervention(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2022) Charbonneau, Brooke Zauner; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Keith A. HutchisonViewing natural stimuli has shown to have beneficial effects on cognition. However, for those in urban areas, nature may not be as accessible. An online intervention may allow them to receive such cognitive benefits. However, specific cognitive processes that may benefit from nature are still not well understood. This study aimed to investigate which cognitive processes could benefit from an online nature intervention. Two hundred and nineteen participants were recruited from Montana State University and completed two tasks that measured either Working Memory Capacity, attentional control, or memory. Within each task, 40 nature images and 40 urban images were randomly presented before each experimental block in the two tasks. Results revealed higher performance after viewing nature images compared to urban images across attentional control tasks but not for Working Memory Capacity or memory. When controlling for preference for natural settings and nature images, the effect became marginal for attentional control tasks. Exploratory analyses revealed that this effect of nature became nonsignificant when controlling across dimensions of fascination and mystery. These results indicate a small, but significant, benefit of viewing natural settings for attentional control, an essential component of Working Memory Capacity. Future research should investigate if benefits increase with longer or more comprehensive interaction with nature, individual differences in the degree of benefits nature can provide, and characteristics that natural settings possess which may increase attentional benefits.Item How do inquiry-focused nature walks influence pre-school students' understanding of their environment, engagement in nature, and emotional regulation?(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2021) Kakuk, Camas S.; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Greg FrancisThe purpose of this study is to discover whether there is measurable value in adding elements of nature school philosophy to a traditional Montessori preschool, even in an imperfect or transitional environment. Do inquiry-focused nature walks influence preschool students' understanding of their environment, engagement in nature, or emotional regulation? In this project I attempted to measure the impact of a daily inquiry walk, through several data streams: a parent survey, a nature inquiry checklist based on the NGSS kindergarten science standards, and by direct observation of nap and walk time and quality. Despite many setbacks and school closures, our initial findings suggest positive results in the areas of healthy sleep, knowledge and understanding of the natural world, and emotional and behavioral health.Item Exploring the conceptual framework and knowledge base of nature-based experiential education(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Education, Health & Human Development, 2020) Meyer, Joshua Joseph; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Robert CarsonThis study examined the current status of Nature Based Experiential Education (NBEE) with respect to its underlying knowledge base and conceptual framework. Compared to other professions, including K-12 education, these formalized attributes have appeared to be fairly minimal. Anecdotally, NBEE draws upon an eclectic array of sources for inspiration and knowledge, while practitioners rely extensively on their own acquired base of personal experience for guidance. If this is true, then there is a certain element of rugged individualism to be admired. The tradeoff, though, would be a commensurate inability to form a cohesive discourse community, to identify and codify best practice, to establish a coherent research agenda to advance the state of the art, and to support either professional development or the establishment of standards in any kind of systematic and meaningful manner. Assuming that these are desirable goals, the initial challenge was to determine what sources of knowledge are most prominent among its practitioners. This study addressed that problem by using a qualitative mixed methods approach. The researcher employed three separate but complementary methods - by critically reviewing NBEE-related literature, by interviewing individuals with expertise in NBEE, and by surveying NBEE practitioners. The results of this study tend to support the anecdotal view that practitioner knowledge is eclectic, diverse, and largely dependent upon the experiences of individual practitioners, a kind of folk craft which is nevertheless shared among members of the field. It also revealed a small but robust inventory of inspirational and informative publications, some widely known. The project itself was met with interest, as practitioners and experts generally agreed that the profession would benefit from a more systematic and contemporary foundation of canonical knowledge and guiding principles. The study concludes by making several recommendations on how these goals can be served.Item Grizzly bears and humans at two moth aggregation sites in Wyoming(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Agriculture, 2020) Nunlist, Erika Ana; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Bok SowellHuman interactions with grizzly bears at moth sites is an important management issue because of the potential for displacing bears and the implications for human safety. The objective of our study was to quantify human and bear use overlap and interactions associated with two of the most human-accessible moth sites in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Our field work was conducted during the summers of 2017 and 2018. We conducted systematic bear surveys and analyzed the data using a resource selection function. Human use was quantified through trailhead monitoring, peak log entries, and opportunistic documentation. Hiking route data were collected using GPS tracking units distributed at trailheads. Human-bear overlap was assessed by comparing human and bear use and validated against interaction location data. We conducted 293 surveys and documented 266 bear locations. Landscape covariates describing temperature, moisture, terrain, and landcover were important to grizzly bear use. We recorded very different human use levels between the two study sites (North site: 3 groups/year; South site: 35 groups/year). Human use at the North site was dispersed and associated with hunting and use at the South site was most often associated with peak climbing and/or bear viewing and was concentrated along one primary route to the peak. We documented a total of 43 interactions (at the South site only) and obtained location data for 29 of those interactions. During human-bear interactions, bears strongly avoided human presence 80% of the time and had no apparent reaction 20% of the time. Most interactions occurred immediately around the South site peak (14/29) or along the primary route (12/29), areas that we identified to have high human and bear use overlap. We confirmed significant human safety and bear disturbance management concerns. Human safety concerns were most apparent in uneducated, and consequently unprepared, mountain climbing groups with small groups sizes (<4 people, n=64/70). Bear disturbance concerns were apparent from numerous interactions that resulted in bear displacement. Overall, we suggest that the concern expressed by managers over human and bear use overlap at the South site is warranted. Mitigation efforts should be explained in a management plan.Item A turbulent upriver flow: steamboat narratives of nature, technology, and humans in Montana Territory(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2019) Kelly, Evan Graham; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Mark FiegeFor a 25 year period in the second half of the 19th century, steamboat travel was a critically important transportation technology which influenced the material, social, and cultural existence of people and landscapes in the Montana region. Building on methodological approaches developed in New Western History and Environmental History, this study argues that steamboats in Montana played a significant role in shaping cultural, demographic, and environmental changes in the area. Steamboats and their crews shaped the dynamic exchange of cultures, materials, and energy between people, landscapes, and technologies. This project stresses that the changes in human-environment relationships in the region influenced people in different ways depending on their race, class, gender, and ethnicity. This thesis argues that steamboats and their crews tapped-into and altered existing systems of material and energy exchange, reshaping energy regimes and augmenting environmental realities in the region. At the same time, steamboats influenced human actions and perceptions of the world around them. The layout of this project begins with an introduction chapter articulating methodological approaches and frameworks used in this analysis. The second chapter provides background on the changing natural and human geographies of the region, while the third chapter provides a history of steamboat technology as well as an overview of the labor, materials, and auxiliary technologies required to operate steamboats. Chapters four through seven present four chronologically organized case-studies and these narratives are used as lenses through which the broader implications of steamboat transportation in the region are examined. The final chapter briefly examines the steamboat Montana and the decline of steamboat travel in the early 1880s before offering a summary and conclusion of findings.Item On life and death: vitality, mortality salience, and worldview defense(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2018) Sanders, Courtney Suzanne; Co-Chairs, Graduate Committee: Jessi L. Smith and Ian HandleyHuman experience is most notably characterized by feeling or being 'alive.' However, according to Terror Management Theory (TMT), humans possess the awareness of their own mortality, and the resulting potential for existential anxiety produced by mortality salience might interact with vitality, or the subjective experience of enthusiasm and aliveness. The construct of vitality includes attributes such as resilience and self-esteem, which is why vitality was predicted to be a more holistic approach to dealing with the potential death anxiety triggered by mortality salience. TMT operates under the notion that anxiety from the realization of one's mortality is managed in part by embracing cultural worldviews, or psychological systems that provide life with meaning. When one fails to employ such a psychological buffer in the face of mortality concerns, this results in an increased defensiveness toward those who threaten or violate cultural worldviews. As such, Study 1 hypothesized that, under mortality salience, those low in a self-report measure of vitality would react more defensively to a moral transgressor than those high in vitality. To test this prediction, 176 individuals completed a self-report measure of vitality and were randomly assigned to provide a written response to two open-ended questions about their own death or to two parallel questions about watching television. Then, following a necessary delay, all participants provided judgments of moral transgressors; previous work shows that reminders of death lead to harsher judgments on this scale. No evidence for buffering was found in the results of Study 1, and findings failed to replicate past TMT research. To better understand vitality as a construct, Study 2 randomly assigned 90 individuals to view photos of either natural, outdoor scenes, or photos of built, outdoor scenes and were subsequently measured on vitality. Results of Study 2 conceptually replicated findings of previous work illustrating that those exposed to photos of nature reported higher levels of vitality than those exposed to photos of built environments. These findings strengthen evidence of the vitalizing effects of nature and supports contact with nature as a potential factor in future studies on vitality. Alternative explanations and implications are discussed.Item Twist and mess(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 1994) Filloux, Marianne IsabelleIn these paintings I have found it essential to create a two dimensional space which depicts the forest in a life-like scale. Landscape imagery which presents nature as miniaturized often depicts the natural world as diminutive and merely picturesque. I want to convey action within the forest These paintings are the product of my "re"action to the forests’ intimate and yet potentially dangerous interior. This reaction is dependent on my observation of nature as a force which easts in spite of my presence. The undercurrent of fear often felt in nature may have as much to do with feeling we are in a domain that ultimately falls out of our control, as it does with the undeniable physical dangers which occur in this territory.Item Paintings and monoprints(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 1991) Laing-Malcolmson, BonnieBetween the subject and the final painting lies a middle ground, a place of memory, response, process, and risk. My intent is that my paintings grow from this middle ground. My paintings are born of temporal things, a protracted drive through our wide western landscape may lull me into a state where a cloudburst slamming into a mountainside evokes a sharp flash of memory. Transformed, I relive a vivid moment of my life; the glimpsed landscape becomes a visual equivalent for the evoked memory. By reliving a moment of life I am more alive, simultaneously inhabiting present and past. William Carlos Williams wrote in his poem The Descent: "and no whiteness (lost) is so white as the memory of whiteness.” The mind released from the present is an intense world. I aim to capture that intensity in paint.Item Sculpture(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 1984) Parsons, Elizabeth Ann; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: John E. BurkeMy sculpture is a record of my experience and it proposes an experience for the viewer. I am seeking a balance which is both engaging and enigmatic. My experience is the process of making the sculpture. I work in an intuitive way, never knowing the exact outcome; the materials and forms show me how they will work together. I want the parts to became a whole and to tell a story, though not necessarily a literal one. I contrast geometric forms with a way of working which is a repetitive and gradual building, similar to the way things grow. The sense of movement I imply in my sculpture relates to movement in nature. I am interested in the way things get caught and built up by wind, rain, snow, etc. My work and processes derive more from my subconscious understanding of nature and my relationship to it, and its rhythms and layerings, than the actual appearance of the natural world. Sone of my forms make references to boats and houses which are both simple geometric, archetypal shapes. The use of the boat form mirrors a movement or journey through life. Boats and houses become our smaller environments and set parameters from which we view the world. These environments are in constant motion and vulnerable to change. Because nature is ever present and dominant, the parameters we define are essentially false, as is our sense of control and stability. Still, it is human nature to look for and attach ourselves to those things. In my newer work, I use paper for its apparitional arid ephemeral qualities which allow the forms to fade in and out. I have stopped using natural materials such as sticks and rocks because their reality does not allow for that experience of a vision which I am interested in. I also do not want to rely on their inherent beauty. I want my sculpture to have a unique and less obvious beauty. My sculptures are both a realization and a completion. They are a manifestation of materials, ideas and processes which have a self-contained, mysterious meaning and function.
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