Matching Items (6)
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- All Subjects: Evolution & development
- Creators: Collins, James
- Creators: Cohen, Adam B.
Description
Infectious diseases have been a major threat to survival throughout human history. Humans have developed a behavioral immune system to prevent infection by causing individuals to avoid people, food, and objects that could be contaminated. This current project investigates how ambient temperature affects the activation of this system. Because temperature is positively correlated with the prevalence of many deadly diseases, I predict that temperature moderates the behavioral immune system, such that a disease prime will have a stronger effect in a hot environment compared to a neutral environment and one's avoidant behaviors will be more extreme. Participants were placed in a hot room (M = 85F) or a neutral room (M = 77F) and shown a disease prime slide show or a neutral slide show. Disgust sensitivity and perceived vulnerability surveys were used to measure an increased perceived risk to disease. A taste test between a disgusting food item (gummy bugs) and a neutral food item (gummy animals) measured food avoidance. There was no significant avoidance of the gummy and no significant difference in ratings of disgust sensitivity or perceived vulnerability as a function of temperature conditions. There were no significant interactions between temperature and disease. The conclusion is that this study did not provide evidence that temperature moderates the effect of disease cues on behavior.
ContributorsOsborne, Elizabeth (Author) / Cohen, Adam B. (Thesis advisor) / Kwan, Sau (Committee member) / Neuberg, Steven (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
Evolution is the foundation of biology, yet it remains controversial even among college biology students. Acceptance of evolution is important for students if we want them to incorporate evolution into their scientific thinking. However, students’ religious beliefs are a consistent barrier to their acceptance of evolution due to a perceived conflict between religion and evolution. Using pre-post instructional surveys of students in introductory college biology, Study 1 establishes instructional strategies that can be effective for reducing students' perceived conflict between religion and evolution. Through interviews and qualitative analyses, Study 2 documents how instructors teaching evolution at public universities may be resistant towards implementing strategies that can reduce students' perceived conflict, perhaps because of their own lack of religious beliefs and lack of training and awareness about students' conflict with evolution. Interviews with religious students in Study 3 reveals that religious college biology students can perceive their instructors as unfriendly towards religion which can negatively impact these students' perceived conflict between religion and evolution. Study 4 explores how instructors at Christian universities, who share the same Christian backgrounds as their students, do not struggle with implementing strategies that reduce students' perceived conflict between religion and evolution. Cumulatively, these studies reveal a need for a new instructional framework for evolution education that takes into account the religious cultural difference between instructors who are teaching evolution and students who are learning evolution. As such, a new instructional framework is then described, Religious Cultural Competence in Evolution Education (ReCCEE), that can help instructors teach evolution in a way that can reduce students' perceived conflict between religion and evolution, increase student acceptance of evolution, and create more inclusive college biology classrooms for religious students.
ContributorsBarnes, Maryann Elizabeth (Author) / Brownell, Sara (Thesis advisor) / Nesse, Randolph (Committee member) / Collins, James (Committee member) / Husman, Jenefer (Committee member) / Maienschein, Jane (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018
Description
How fast is evolution? In this dissertation I document a profound change that occurred around the middle of the 20th century in the way that ecologists conceptualized the temporal and spatial scales of adaptive evolution, through the lens of British plant ecologist Anthony David Bradshaw (1926–2008). In the early 1960s, one prominent ecologist distinguished what he called “ecological time”—around ten generations—from “evolutionary time”— around half of a million years. For most ecologists working in the first half of the 20th century, evolution by natural selection was indeed a slow and plodding process, tangible in its products but not in its processes, and inconsequential for explaining most ecological phenomena. During the 1960s, however, many ecologists began to see evolution as potentially rapid and observable. Natural selection moved from the distant past—a remote explanans for both extant biological diversity and paleontological phenomena—to a measurable, quantifiable mechanism molding populations in real time.
The idea that adaptive evolution could be rapid and highly localized was a significant enabling condition for the emergence of ecological genetics in the second half of the 20th century. Most of what historians know about that conceptual shift and the rise of ecological genetics centers on the work of Oxford zoologist E. B. Ford and his students on polymorphism in Lepidotera, especially industrial melanism in Biston betularia. I argue that ecological genetics in Britain was not the brainchild of an infamous patriarch (Ford), but rather the outgrowth of a long tradition of pastureland research at plant breeding stations in Scotland and Wales, part of a discipline known as “genecology” or “experimental taxonomy.” Bradshaw’s investigative activities between 1948 and 1968 were an outgrowth of the specific brand of plant genecology practiced at the Welsh and Scottish Plant Breeding stations. Bradshaw generated evidence that plant populations with negligible reproductive isolation—separated by just a few meters—could diverge and adapt to contrasting environmental conditions in just a few generations. In Bradshaw’s research one can observe the crystallization of a new concept of rapid adaptive evolution, and the methodological and conceptual transformation of genecology into ecological genetics.
The idea that adaptive evolution could be rapid and highly localized was a significant enabling condition for the emergence of ecological genetics in the second half of the 20th century. Most of what historians know about that conceptual shift and the rise of ecological genetics centers on the work of Oxford zoologist E. B. Ford and his students on polymorphism in Lepidotera, especially industrial melanism in Biston betularia. I argue that ecological genetics in Britain was not the brainchild of an infamous patriarch (Ford), but rather the outgrowth of a long tradition of pastureland research at plant breeding stations in Scotland and Wales, part of a discipline known as “genecology” or “experimental taxonomy.” Bradshaw’s investigative activities between 1948 and 1968 were an outgrowth of the specific brand of plant genecology practiced at the Welsh and Scottish Plant Breeding stations. Bradshaw generated evidence that plant populations with negligible reproductive isolation—separated by just a few meters—could diverge and adapt to contrasting environmental conditions in just a few generations. In Bradshaw’s research one can observe the crystallization of a new concept of rapid adaptive evolution, and the methodological and conceptual transformation of genecology into ecological genetics.
ContributorsPeirson, Bruce Richard Erick (Author) / Laubichler, Manfred D (Thesis advisor) / Maienschein, Jane (Thesis advisor) / Creath, Richard (Committee member) / Collins, James (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
Insecticide resistance is a continuing issue that negatively affects both public health and agriculture and allows vector-borne diseases to spread throughout the globe. To improve resistance management strategies (RMS), robust susceptibility bioassays need to be performed in order to fill the gap of the relationship between resistant and susceptible genotype and phenotype, and a deeper knowledge of how bioassay data relates to vector control success or failure is imperative. A bioassay method that is infrequently used but yields robust results is the topical application bioassay, where the insect is directly treated with a constant volume and concentration of an insecticide via a syringe. To bring more attention to this method, my colleagues and I published a paper in the Journal of Visualized Experiments where the optimized protocol of the topical application bioassay for mosquitoes and fruit flies is described, and the strengths and limitations to the method are explained. To further investigate insecticide susceptibility tests, I set up my individual project where I used Aedes aegypti mosquitoes to compare the topical application bioassay to the commonly used Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) bottle bioassay and World Health Organization (WHO) tube test. The objective of this study was to test which method exhibited the most variability in mortality results, which would guide the choice of assay to determine the link between resistant and susceptible genotype and phenotype. The results showed that the topical application method did indeed exhibit the least amount of variation, followed by the CDC bottle bioassay (WHO data is currently being collected). This suggests that the topical application bioassay could be a useful tool in insecticide resistance surveillance studies, and, depending on the goal, may be better than the CDC and WHO tube tests for assessing resistance levels at a given site. This study challenges the value of the widely used CDC and WHO assays and provides a discussion on the importance of technical and practical resistance assays. This will help vector control specialists to collect accurate surveillance data that will inform effective RMS.
ContributorsAlthoff, Rachel (Author) / Huijben, Silvie (Thesis advisor) / Harris, Robin (Committee member) / Collins, James (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022
Description
Transgenic experiments in Drosophila have proven to be a useful tool aiding in the
determination of mammalian protein function. A CNS specific protein, dCORL is a
member of the Sno/Ski family. Sno acts as a switch between Dpp/dActivin signaling.
dCORL is involved in Dpp and dActivin signaling, but the two homologous mCORL
protein functions are unknown. Conducting transgenic experiments in the adult wings,
and third instar larval brains using mCORL1, mCORL2 and dCORL are used to provide
insight into the function of these proteins. These experiments show mCORL1 has a
different function from mCORL2 and dCORL when expressed in Drosophila. mCORL2
and dCORL have functional similarities that are likely conserved. Six amino acid
substitutions between mCORL1 and mCORL2/dCORL may be the reason for the
functional difference. The evolutionary implications of this research suggest the
conservation of a switch between Dpp/dActivin signaling that predates the divergence of
arthropods and vertebrates.
determination of mammalian protein function. A CNS specific protein, dCORL is a
member of the Sno/Ski family. Sno acts as a switch between Dpp/dActivin signaling.
dCORL is involved in Dpp and dActivin signaling, but the two homologous mCORL
protein functions are unknown. Conducting transgenic experiments in the adult wings,
and third instar larval brains using mCORL1, mCORL2 and dCORL are used to provide
insight into the function of these proteins. These experiments show mCORL1 has a
different function from mCORL2 and dCORL when expressed in Drosophila. mCORL2
and dCORL have functional similarities that are likely conserved. Six amino acid
substitutions between mCORL1 and mCORL2/dCORL may be the reason for the
functional difference. The evolutionary implications of this research suggest the
conservation of a switch between Dpp/dActivin signaling that predates the divergence of
arthropods and vertebrates.
ContributorsStinchfield, Michael J (Author) / Newfeld, Stuart J (Thesis advisor) / Capco, David (Committee member) / Laubichler, Manfred (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019
Description
The present study tested the hypothesis that women dress modestly to signal to other women that they pose no mate poaching threat and are sexually restricted, and that this is especially true for religious women. Participants were 392 Muslim women living in the United States. They read two passages describing fictional situations in which they met with a potential female friend and then indicated what kind of outfit they would wear in both situations. In one situation, the participant obtained a reputation for promiscuity; in the other situation, reputation was not mentioned. I predicted that participants would choose more modest outfits for the promiscuous reputation passage, because if women dress modestly to signal sexual restrictedness, then they should dress more modestly around women with whom they have a reputation for promiscuity—to counteract such a reputation, women may wish to send a strong signal that they are not promiscuous. The hypothesis was partially supported: Less religious women chose more modest outfits for the promiscuous reputation situation than they did for the no reputation situation. This suggests that some women dress modestly to signal sexual restrictedness to other women, but that this is especially true for women who are less religious, not more. More religious women dress more modestly than less religious women, but they may not dress modestly to signal sexual restrictedness. Two important goals for this area of research are to determine the proximate reasons that more religious women dress modestly and to investigate modest dress among non-Muslim religious women.
ContributorsNorthover, Stefanie Blair (Author) / Cohen, Adam B. (Thesis advisor) / Neuberg, Steven L. (Committee member) / Kenrick, Douglas T. (Committee member) / Lieberman, Debra (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020