Theses and Dissertations

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death worldwide and statistical analysis of suicide by profession reveals that physicians and veterinarians experience abnormally high suicide rates. This paper seeks to provide a comprehensive literature review over what some general theories of suicide are, why these professions exhibit high suicide rates, what assistance is currently being provided, and where do these assistance efforts succeed or fail. Moreover, this paper addresses what advancements may be made within these fields to further combat suicide in physicians and veterinarians. To achieve this, general theories behind suicide, risk factors unique to or heavily prevalent in these professions, and current assistance efforts are read, organized, and summarized.<br/><br/>A summary of these risk factors includes stress and mental health disorders accumulated through school and work, personal and professional isolation, access to lethal substances, suicide contagion, exposure to euthanasia, and the role of perfectionism. There are several assistance efforts in place with the most successful ones being highly personalized, but many are still underutilized. Moreover, the stigma of suicide pervades these professions and is addressed by several researchers as something to combat or prevent. Going forward, it is hopeful that not only will more assistance efforts will be created and provided for physicians and veterinarians suffering from suicidal tendencies, but efforts to reduce the stigma of suicide be implemented and utilized as soon as possible.

The status of Earth’s diversity is deteriorating quickly which will continue to impact humans’ way of life, as well as every other living creature, in all regions of the world. However, there are organizations taking action to protect biodiversity on our planet. The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) is one of those organizations and includes 196 signatories from around the world who are committed to strategies to preserve their biodiversity (Secretariat). Indeed, 98% of the parties which have participated in the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) have created national biodiversity strategies (NBS) and action plans (NBSAPs) (Secretariat). Yet, there are still countries that have yet to partake in these efforts. America continues to hold out against ratifying the CBD and remains the only developed country without a National Biodiversity Strategy. As an NBS for the U.S. is under consideration, my goal is to understand what works from previous plans. In particular, I focus on stakeholder engagement in Conservation Biodiversity Action Plans. Stakeholder engagement is important because, without it, there may be insufficient levels of integration of the action plans, which can lead to the failure of the CBDs conservation efforts. To address this question, I analyze the 193 strategies created for countries across the globe. My review describes the ways that stakeholders are engaged in National Biodiversity Strategies for CBD member countries. All plans mention some form of engagement. The most common types mentioned are ‘Education’, ‘Communication’, and ‘Training’. Examining the plans further reveals that most forms of engagement often are just mentioned and not completed. Close to 58% of the engagement forms are only completed about 50% of the time. Exceptions are surveys, interviews, and workshops, which are each completed in over 70% of plans that mention them. I then use this information to provide practical recommendations for creating an effective NBSAP for the United States.

Theories about the human origin in evolution and religion are fundamentally countering beliefs that are still debated to this day. This study continues to explore this relationship in the college population at a public university with the intention of targeting a diverse religious population. This research hopes to answer the question: does having greater literacy in evolution lead to a noninterventionist perspective on evolution? The prediction is that evidence of increased evolution comprehension will influence students to have a more agnostic, or noninterventionist, view on evolution. An evolution class was given a survey that had two parts broken into demographic and evolution sections with one question that asks about compatibility between evolution and religion. This was given twice in a single semester to track the growth of evolution knowledge and any other differences. There were 265 students in the initial survey, but only 223 responses in the post-survey. The compatibility question had 8 statements that range from creationist to atheistic perspectives and was divided into two sides: interventionist (divine involvement) and noninterventionist (deity may be present but does not intervene). More than 70% of the class had a noninterventionist perspective on evolution despite the Christian categories being the second largest group students identified with after agnostic. The agnostic statement was the top choice followed by the atheistic answer on the noninterventionist side. Lastly, there was some growth of evolution knowledge for each religious category in the evolution section but is not significant for interpretation. Based on the collected data, it is not sufficient to answer the question and requires more data collection via a longitudinal study.