2024-03-29T11:30:12Zhttps://research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk/oai/requestoai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/98872019-03-29T15:28:16Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2016-11-28T13:42:09Z
urn:hdl:10023/9887
Home-ing in on domestic energy research : home comfort and energy demand
Ellsworth-Krebs, Katherine
Reid, Louise Anne
Hunter, Colin
Findlay, Allan M.
University of St Andrews
Home
Energy
Comfort
Everyday life
Climate change has become a major concern for research and policy in recent decades, and housing has been an important area to tackle as globally this sector accounts for roughly a quarter of energy demand, and its resulting carbon emissions (Staffell et al., 2015). Behaviour change campaigns constitute a significant strand within government responses to reduce carbon emissions. However, on the grounds that environmental impact has little to do with individual’s intentions, there is growing interest in the ordinary, rather than the extraordinary (e.g. pro-environmental values), and the socio-material transformation of collective conventions (Shove, 2010). Research emerging from this ‘practice turn’ is often underpinned by evidence of changing expectations of comfort that undermine improvements in energy efficiency (Hitchings and Lee, 2008; Walker et al., 2016). Notably, research indicates that it is increasingly common for indoor environments to be maintained within a narrow range of temperatures through mechanical heating and cooling, which has significant implications for energy (Shove, 2003).
While these practice-informed studies have successfully offered new avenues for intervention in sustainable consumption, home comfort has been rather narrowly investigated and has often been equated with thermal comfort. Yet expectations of home comfort and household management decisions are much more complex and multifaceted than the desire to be sufficiently warm or cool. A focus on thermal comfort has arguably trivialised other meanings of home comfort that might also be significant to understanding patterns of domestic energy demand. The aim of this thesis therefore was to develop a concept of home comfort to inform understandings, debates and policy related to domestic energy demand, and this thesis presents data from whole-household interviews, house tours, ideal drawings and home energy adviser interviews to address this aim.
A key finding of this thesis was that home comfort is a sense of relaxation and wellbeing, which results from companionship and having some sense of control in the home. Broadening out understandings of occupant satisfaction to account for some of this complexity draws attention to householder’s perception of the space per person ‘needed’ to facilitate comfortably sharing the home with others. Engaging with the trend towards increasing space per person is important because it has the potential to reduce energy demand for space heating without falling back into emphasising technical intervention or questioning the standardisation of thermal comfort. Furthermore, householder’s actions to reduce domestic energy demand were found to be tightly, if implicitly, linked to expectations of home comfort and processes of homemaking. It is important to remember that changes to the home are not simply the result of financial rationalisation or attempts to improve thermal comfort. There is certainly scope for the concept of home comfort to inform understanding of domestic energy demand and to highlight alternative strategies to ‘steer’ towards more sustainable forms of everyday life.
2016-11-28T13:42:09Z
2016-11-28T13:42:09Z
2017-06-21
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/9887
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
217 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/281002023-10-30T10:46:06Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-08-04T09:51:46Z
urn:hdl:10023/28100
Managing urban deer in Scotland : understanding perceptions to shape policymaking
Whitefield, Abigail Claire Ella
Warren, Charles
Davies, Althea
Deer management
Urban wildlife
Urban deer
Urban deer management
Wildlife management
Environmental social science
Q-methodology
Social research
Perception research
Scotland
Land management
Human-wildlife interactions
Human dimensions of wildlife
Rising populations of deer in Scottish urban areas are creating increased potential for conflict, raising questions about whether they need to be managed. Yet, there has been little research or policy focus on urban deer in Scotland thus far. This thesis investigates perceptions of urban deer and their management in Scotland, including the role of Local Authorities, to help shape future policymaking on the topic. Four methods were used: (i) interviews with experts, (ii) a Q-methodology study with Local Authority staff, (iii) an online survey of local councillors and (iv) a postal survey of the public. Whilst urban deer are generally welcomed in Scotland, views on whether deer numbers are too high differed between stakeholders. Perceptions of the impacts of urban deer were also varied, but deer- vehicle collisions and deer welfare were the issues recognised most frequently. There was broad consensus that urban deer need to be managed. However, current practices are perceived to be insufficient, with NatureScot and Local Authorities having paid limited attention to urban deer thus far. Views differ on which management methods should be used in the Scottish urban context. Clear differences between rural and urban deer management emerged, with fragmented landholdings (such as in dense housing areas) and higher human populations adding challenges to management. There is overall support for Local Authorities taking responsibility for urban deer management on their own land and beyond their landownership. Obstacles to their engagement include concerns about public and councillor perceptions, safety, and a lack of resources, experience and support. Three factors impacting effective urban deer management in Scotland are recognised: the need for context specific understandings and responses, the need for awareness-raising amongst stakeholders to gain support and increase action, and the need to fill gaps in data and research. A policy framework for future effective urban deer management in Scotland is proposed.
2023-08-04T09:51:46Z
2023-08-04T09:51:46Z
2023-11-28
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/28100
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/561
en
Embargo period has ended, thesis made available in accordance with University regulations.
328
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/272592024-03-03T14:45:02Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-03-24T10:08:05Z
urn:hdl:10023/27259
Exploring the effect of location and time on human mobility flow networks
Sekulic, Sebastijan
Demsar, Urska
Long, Jed
Kulu, Hill
Sila-Nowicka, Katarzyna
Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
Scottish Graduate School of Social Science (SGSSS)
Spatio-temporal networks
Spatio-temporal analysis
Flow analysis
Flow networks
Bike sharing systems
Census flow data
Community detection
Contemporary flow data are used to investigate a number of social science phenomena: examples include flows inferred from mobile phone data, migration flows, commuting flows, or taxi flows between pick‐up and set‐down points. This PhD thesis develops new bespoke advanced quantitative methods for flow data to better understand patterns in flows and their relationship with space and time. Flow data are mathematically represented as geographic networks and are due to their size and complicated structure a typical example of big data. In geography, there is a lack of appropriate methods for their analysis. While some disciplines, such as physics, have recently developed flow methods, these methods are not suitable for flow networks that are geographically constrained, as the methods are not scalable to large geographic networks, nor do they consider the effects of geographic location. Further, in physics, there is no consideration for temporal conditions which affect human mobility. This thesis explores different methods of flow network analysis by gradually experimenting with different approaches and network complexities. We begin the exploration by utilising community detection methods and a commuting network. Community detection allows us to find clusters within the network that have more connections between a location within them than they have to other clusters. We can consider this as a subcomponent of the network that has most of the movement happening within, and only a limited amount of movement towards other subcomponents. Then to complicate things further, we test different types of geographical weighting to the network. In that way, we confirm how to geographically weigh the distances depending on the dataset and decided purpose. Finally, we add a temporal component into the analysis and develop a bespoke method for spatio-temporal network clustering. The method allows us to look at time and space as a continuous variable and to detect patterns that span over different time periods. This would allow us to capture a pattern that only represents a few hours in a day and a pattern that captures the whole weekend behaviour without explicitly saying we are investigating a specific timespan. The results show that space and time make a significant difference in spatio-temporal analysis and the method enables us to simplify and explore huge networks in a seemingly complex way.
2023-03-24T10:08:05Z
2023-03-24T10:08:05Z
2022-11-29
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/27259
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/365
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
2027-09-26
Restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 26th September 2027
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International
159
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/278992023-07-07T02:01:03Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-07-06T09:53:13Z
urn:hdl:10023/27899
A study of the population burden of cognitive impairment in the US
Sharma, Shubhankar
Hale, Jo Mhairi
Myrskylä, Mikko
Kulu, Hill
Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (MPIDR)
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Sustainable Development
This doctoral thesis investigates novel facets of cognitive health dynamics in the older US population. Prior research on partnership status and cognitive impairment has mainly focused on their association. No study has examined the burden of cognitive impairment without a partner, with partners being an essential source of caregiving, social support, and successful aging. Cognitive impairment often coexists with disability in activities of daily living. However, their cooccurrence (termed coimpairment), a highly disadvantageous health condition, has received less attention in population health research. Furthermore, the absence of a cure for cognitive impairment underscores the importance of identifying its modifiable risk factors. Using advanced multistate models and the longitudinal Health and Retirement Study, this thesis first shows that Blacks, Latinx, and lower-educated have longer expectancies in one of the most expensive health conditions, cognitive impairment, while being unpartnered. Second, these subgroups experience greater lifetime risk of, earlier onset of, and longer expectancy in coimpairment. Counterfactual exercises reveal that educational inequalities play an important role in these disparities. Third, the study shows that loneliness is an important modifiable risk factor for cognitive function and that the association is partially mediated by depression. This PhD thesis significantly advances our understanding of the socio-demographic inequalities in the burden of cognitive impairment in the US.
2023-07-06T09:53:13Z
2023-07-06T09:53:13Z
2023-11-28
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27899
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/539
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
275
The University of St Andrews
The Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/283902023-09-16T02:01:19Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-09-15T10:08:58Z
urn:hdl:10023/28390
Investigating calving dynamics through the development of a new 3D full-Stokes calving model and its application at Jakobshavn Isbrae, West Greenland
Wheel, Iain
Benn, Douglas I.
Crawford, Anna J.
Todd, Joe
Cowton, Tom
Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)
Glaciology
Calving
Climate change
Modelling
A new calving algorithm was developed in the finite element model Elmer/Ice that allows unrestricted calving and terminus advance in 3D. The algorithm used the meshing software Mmg to implement anisotropic remeshing and allow for adaptive meshing at each timestep. The development of the algorithm along with the implementation of the crevasse depth calving law produced a new full-Stokes calving model in Elmer/Ice that is laid out in detail in Chapter 4. The new model is shown to be robust and capable of simulating calving across an array of complex geometries. Using a synthetic geometry, the model is applied in Chapter 5 to test a comprehensive list of variables that affect calving dynamics. The simulations show that calving dynamics are predominately altered by fjord or bed geometry, but other factors such as lateral friction or temperature can also alter the simulated calving. Other non-physical model parameters such as mesh resolution or timestep are also shown to have a large impact on modelled calving. Finally, in Chapter 6, the calving model is applied at Jakobshavn Isbrae (Sermeq Kujalleq), Greenland’s largest glacier. This is the first time that the calving dynamics at Jakobshavn Isbrae have been modelled in 3D. This has been a challenge previously due to the large outlet glacier’s dynamic nature. The model is shown to be robust and capable of simulating the calving, but the prediction of calving is underestimated. The crevasse penetration requirement of the crevasse depth calving law needed to be optimised in order for simulations to match observations of advance and retreat, with the optimal crevasse penetration requirement being 94.5\%. Ice-melange back stress was key to winter readvancement and essential for the model to match observations. However, the ultimate position of the terminus was determined by the geometry at the glacier bed. Importantly, this showed a large step forward in modelling capabilities, where unrestricted 3D calving was modelled at a large dynamic tidewater glacier in a continuum. This work is vital to improving our understanding of calving dynamics at tidewater glaciers and therefore enabling calving to be better constrained in future climate projections.
2023-09-15T10:08:58Z
2023-09-15T10:08:58Z
2023-11-28
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/28390
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/611
NE/S006605/1
en
2026-09-04
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 4th September 2026
222
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/253952022-09-22T16:06:55Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2022-05-17T15:46:38Z
urn:hdl:10023/25395
Impacts of outdoor recreation on space-use, behaviour and interspecific interactions of red deer (Cervus elaphus) in the Scottish Highlands
Marion, Solène
Demšar, Urška
Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland
Red deer
Hikers
Spatio-temporal interactions
Outdoor activities
Camera traps
In Scotland, the geographical distribution of red deer (Cervus elaphus scoticus) overlaps with
areas used for popular outdoor activities such as hill walking. This overlap can have multiple
consequences for the animal but also for its successful management. Here, I study the impact of
hiking activity on red deer spatio-temporal distribution, behaviour, and interaction with sheep.
First, to study the impact of hiker activity on deer detection and on their behaviour, camera
traps were placed in transects at different distances (25, 75 and 150m) from the hiking path.
Hiking activity was monitored and classified as busy or quiet. Second, to study how hiking
activity influenced red deer interaction with sheep, camera traps were distributed at various
distances from the hiking path. I found that red deer spatial and temporal response occurred at
less than 150m, as more red deer were detected at 150m than at 25m. During the day, red deer
were detected at greater rates in an isolated area relative to areas close to the hiking path. This
avoidance only occurred on a short temporal scale, as deer returned to areas close to the hiking
path the following night. I did not detect an increase in vigilance or flight behaviour closer to
the hiking path or during busy hiking activity. However, the interaction between sheep and deer
changed with distance from the hiking path, with greater spatial and temporal overlap in areas
further away from the hiking path. I conclude that (i) hikers impact the spatial distribution of
red deer at distances smaller than 150m but that this impact is only of short duration temporal
scale, (ii) hiking activity does not have a significant impact on the behaviour of the animal, and
(iii) hiking activity may influence the interaction between sheep and deer.
2022-05-17T15:46:38Z
2022-05-17T15:46:38Z
2022-06-15
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/25395
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/173
en
2026-12-15
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 15th December 2026
xvii, 167 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
James Hutton Institute
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/215882021-07-27T10:30:17Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2021-03-10T14:08:43Z
urn:hdl:10023/21588
An exploration of the implementation of global REDD+ policy in Nigeria's neo-patrimonial context : implications for sustainable development
Adogame, Aneshimode
Kesby, Mike
Taylor, Ian
REDD+
Global policy
Neo-patrimonial
Governance
Nigeria's context
Sustainable development
REDD+ is a global programme for disbursing funds, primarily to pay national governments in
developing countries to reduce forest carbon emission. REDD+ is presently translated from
global discourse into national arena amidst on-the-ground realities of weak governance,
corruption, and power struggles. This thesis responds to these concerns towards
implementing REDD+ policy sustainably. In the last 5 years, Nigeria REDD+ went through a
national readiness phase and is piloted at sub-national scale. However, its governance is
essentially a political process likely to face strong opposition from those benefiting from the
status quo.
This thesis conducts an exploratory analysis to investigate how global REDD+ policy discourse
transforms in a local political setting, to have in-depth understanding of how different forms
of governance influence forest policy outcomes. I draw on political ecology in an investigation
of the politics over forest management and builds on a modified ‘4Is’ analytical framework –
Institutions, Interests, Ideas and Information – to explore actors’ perceptions to analyse
REDD+. The study was qualitative in design and employed the triangulation approach,
participant observation, document analysis, FGDs and interview methods to establish the
problem. Unpacking REDD+ design and implementation interaction could holistically identify
intrinsic institutional impediments in the context of sustainable development.
An analysis brings up a number of key issues. Actor constellations understand, interpret and
implement REDD+ through a ‘complex’ governance setting, deeply entrenched political
system. This limit the potential for transforming a business-as-usual to achieve emissions
reductions. I question the naïve assumption that Nigeria REDD+ is a “win-win” strategy under
the ‘rules of the game’, as against the performed ‘tricks of the game’ embedded in the political
context.
Throughout this thesis I argue that Nigeria REDD+ is seized upon as an opportunity to promote
neo-patrimonial governance system. Findings suggest therefore, the potential for its long-term
sustainability will be a challenge.
2021-03-10T14:08:43Z
2021-03-10T14:08:43Z
2020-12-01
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/21588
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/37
en
2022-08-31
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Print and electronic copy restricted until 31st August 2022
xx, 271 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/294612024-03-09T03:02:37Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2024-03-08T15:26:07Z
urn:hdl:10023/29461
What drives the community acceptance of onshore wind energy? Exploring the link between ownership, energy justice, and place in Scotland and Newfoundland
Hogan, Jessica
Warren, Charles
Simpson, Michael Charles
McCauley, Darren
Rothermere Foundation
Canada. Social Science and Humanities Research Council
Canadian Centennial Scholarship Fund (CCSF)
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Sustainable Development
Onshore wind energy
Community acceptance
Energy justice
Fair involvement
Fair financial benefits
Place
Sociotechnical imaginaries
Community ownership
Shared ownership
Private ownership
This thesis investigates the key factors influencing community acceptance of onshore wind energy, specifically examining the argument that fair involvement in decision-making and fair financial benefits are powerful determinants. The thesis examines this claim through various methodologies and across two different contexts: Scotland and Newfoundland. The initial papers, focusing on Scotland, employ quantitative surveys to investigate the significance of community ownership and energy justice in determining acceptance. By comparing communities which have different degrees of ownership, that is, community, shared, and private, the first paper highlights the characteristics of ownership that foster community acceptance. Notably, it emphasises the importance of fair involvement and financial benefits, providing evidence that a co-operative can achieve a similar degree of acceptance and energy justice as a fully community-owned project. Building on the findings of the first paper, the Scotland second paper employs multigroup structural equation modelling to empirically test the influence of energy justice factors (fair involvement, fair financial benefits, and perceived turbine impacts) on social acceptance and how these relationships vary according to projects with different ownership structures. The chapter demonstrates that while energy justice factors influence acceptance, their relative importance depends on ownership. For instance, residents near the community-owned project placed greater emphasis on fair involvement, while those near the privately-owned project valued fair financial benefits and perceived impacts. The final paper, focusing on Newfoundland, uses semi-structured interviews to examine how place shapes acceptance and justice perceptions for onshore wind, analysed through sociotechnical imaginaries and a political economic analysis of successive industries in the province. The findings reveal that a shared narrative of struggle stemming from the cod fishery collapse has emerged in local discourses around wind projects, promoting acceptance. Taken together, this research demonstrates that the challenging process of negotiating just, sustainable energy transitions requires an understanding of geographical context.
2024-03-08T15:26:07Z
2024-03-08T15:26:07Z
2024-06-14
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/29461
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/813
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
2026-03-07
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 7 March 2026
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
243
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/277652023-06-11T02:02:07Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-06-09T08:19:30Z
urn:hdl:10023/27765
Ageing in an increasingly smart world : an ethnography of ageing at home with smart and assistive devices
Creaney, Rachel
Reid, Louise Anne
Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
With increasing desires to live at home for longer and have more control of one's healthcare, coupled with rises in smart technology use and affordability, the drive for healthcare smart homes (HSH) from certain policymakers and technologists, particularly in rural communities, has heightened. These digitalised homes aim to enable older people to live independently at home for longer and potentially improve their wellbeing through the use of smart and assistive technologies. Much of the existing literature on the impacts of HSH living is from: healthcare or technocentric domains; shorter term or 'laboratory' settings with individual residents rather than more in-depth research including the wider networks. Furthermore, there is increasing development of DIY versions of HSH (i.e. portable smart and assistive devices gathered by the resident and their wider caring networks to be used in their homes, rather than a tailor-made HSH). Thus, in this thesis I use multiple ethnographic methods (visual, traditional and autoethnographic methods) to explore the longer-term experiences of five older people, and their wider caring networks, living within DIY HSH. I draw on theories and concepts relating to bricolage, dramaturgy, and simulations to explore the experiences of a sense of home, identity formation and future planning within DIY HSH living. I argue there are multiple (and potentially competing) experiences of DIY HSH living concerning sense of home, identity and envisioning the future. This range of experiences is connected to various levels and types of access to devices and technical support (what I term 'vertical noir hierarchies'), and the experiences and motivations of the wider caring networks. Ultimately, through use of multi-modal ethnographic methods and a new conceptual framework, I highlight that a singular experience of DIY HSH living is impossible. This is illustrated through understanding the (often conflicting) experiences of both older DIY HSH residents and their wider caring networks, and their types and levels of access to DIY HSH devices.
2023-06-09T08:19:30Z
2023-06-09T08:19:30Z
2022-06-15
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27765
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/499
en
347
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
Social, Economic and Geographical Sciences Department, James Hutton Institute, Aberdeen
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/189642023-06-14T02:01:55Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-11-20T14:34:30Z
urn:hdl:10023/18964
Benthic foraminifera as a novel bio-monitoring tool in the assessment of environmental impacts linked to marine aquaculture
Alammar, Montaha
Austin, W. E. N. (William E. N.)
The present thesis describes the behaviour of benthic foraminiferal
species in response to various levels of natural and/or anthropogenic
organic matter enrichment in the benthic environment. Loch Creran, on
the west coast of Scotland, was chosen as representative of such
environments, with both organic matter accumulation from natural
sources and an active marine aquaculture industry. An improved,
quantitative understanding of foraminiferal response to the variation in
benthic environmental gradients associated with fish is established.
Furthermore, the performance of these foraminiferal species as a novel
bio-monitoring tool to assess the impact of marine aquaculture is
evaluated. In order to address how aquaculture has influenced the benthic
environment at Loch Creran, foraminifera, sediment grain-size, organic
matter (OM) content and abundances were analysed in surface samples
collected from beneath and around floating fish cage complexes. In this
study, we followed the Foraminiferal Bio-Monitoring (FOBIMO)
protocol (Schönfeld. et al., 2012), which proposed a standardised
methodology of using foraminifera as a bio-monitoring tool to assess the
quality of the marine ecosystem and applied these protocols to the rapidly
expanding marine aquaculture sector in Scotland.
The thesis quantified the potential of benthic foraminifera for use
in reconstructing paleoenvironments from areas the pre-impacted
environmental status in areas exposed to environmental stress (e.g.
accumulation of organic matter) following the onset of marine
aquaculture. Twenty stations were sampled within Loch Creran to
describe the spatial and down-core (temporal) distribution pattern of
benthic foraminiferal assemblages. For the spatial distribution study, triplicate, Rose-Bengal stained samples from an interval of (0_1cm) below
the sediment surface were studied at each station from below the fish cages
(impacted stations) to a distance of over 1 km from the farming sites and
from the upper basin, where fish caged are absent and a natural source of
organic matter exists from the River Creran. Morphospecies counts were
conducted, and the organic carbon and the grain size distributions
determined. For the down-core study, two short sediment cores, SC-02-A
and SC-04-B were examined to present the fish farming site and a more
distant, non-fish farming site. The two cores were analysed to assess the
temporal (down-core) changes in benthic foraminiferal distribution. The
total organic matter (TOM) content was determined and indicates
temporal changes in OM accumulation rate and associated benthic
foraminiferal responses.
The results indicated 4 foraminiferal assemblage groups within the
surface sediments: (i) A1 (the reference site), (ii) A2-1 (non-fish farming
sites), (iii) A2-2 (fish farming sites) and (iv) the upper basin assemblage
group (River Creran). The assemblages were found to be well adapted to
a high input of OM contents and a minimum dissolved oxygen (DO2)
penetration depth into the sediment. The majority of foraminiferal species
at the impacted sites were agglutinated species (e.g. Eggerella scabra),
likely related to the presence high sediment (OM) contents and low
dissolved oxygen concentrations. Down-core distribution data indicated
that a faunal shift has taken place, correlating with changes in OM
enrichment in the sediment. The species diversity of foraminifera
decreases above this OM enrichment horizon in the fish farming core.
Specimens of Ammonia beccarii were dominant in the lowermost
sediment core (i.e. the pre-impacted sediment). Above 7 cm, the
assemblages change and become dominated by Eggerella scabra,
coinciding with a marked change in sediment colour. The results of this
study highlight the potential of using benthic foraminifera as reliable
indicators of pre-impacted marine habitats, with great potential to
understand environmental history around the globe.
2019-11-20T14:34:30Z
2019-11-20T14:34:30Z
2019-06-26
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/18964
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-18964
en
vii, v, 200 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/175422021-02-23T17:58:31Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-04-18T15:15:03Z
urn:hdl:10023/17542
Volunteer tourism : a path to buen vivir?
Owen, Steven
Laurie, Nina
Leahy, Sharon
University of St Andrews. 600th Anniversary Scholarship
Volunteer tourism
Buen vivir
The popularity of volunteer tourism stems from its discursive positioning as fostering
mutually beneficial relations between volunteer tourists and the host destination.
Despite extensive scholarly work, the outcomes of this activity for host communities
and volunteer tourists are still unclear. This study examines how volunteer tourism is
interpreted across a range of stakeholders in two indigenous communities in Ecuador
- one Kichwa community in the town of Chilcapamba and one Tsa'chila community
near the town of Santa Domingo. Employing qualitative research methods of
interviews, focus groups, participant observation, document analysis and diary
analysis, this study makes multiple contributions to existing literatures. Through the
inclusion of host community members, it provides new insights into a tourist practice,
predominantly understood from the perspective of volunteer tourists from the Global
North. Moreover, it provides an alternative reading of volunteer tourism by framing
this activity through a worldview and political discourse originating from the Global
South - Buen Vivir or 'good living'.
The study argues that volunteer tourism functions through and reinforces the
structures and imaginaries of an unequal and uneven global economic system.
Chapter Four contextualises the study, deducing that despite using the discourses of
Buen Vivir the Ecuadorian state employs practices typical of the neoliberal agenda.
Chapter Five illustrates how host community members adopt and negotiate
knowledge and practices from the Global North, to satisfy the demands of the
volunteer tourism industry. Following this, Chapter Six argues that marginalised
community members mobilise the discourses of Buen Vivir, to challenge neoliberal
practices, which perpetuate existing inequalities in the communities. Finally, Chapter
Seven proposes that volunteer tourists demonstrate a neoliberal subjectivity in how
they manage and narrate their experience in the host communities. The study
concludes that volunteer tourism embodies the spirit of neoliberal development
models, whilst Buen Vivir provides a critical avenue for unsettling this agenda, by
providing a framework through which alternative possibilities can be imagined.
2019-04-18T15:15:03Z
2019-04-18T15:15:03Z
2019-06-26
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17542
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-17542
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Attribution 4.0 International
268 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/272182024-03-03T14:27:44Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-03-20T10:40:33Z
urn:hdl:10023/27218
Assessing the vulnerability of marine sedimentary organic carbon : the influence of anthropogenic disturbance
Black, Kirsty Eleanor
Austin, William
University of St Andrews
Marine Scotland Science
Organic carbon
Marine sediment
Fishing impact
Carbon cycle
Sediment disturbance
As anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO₂) concentrations rise, there is an increasing need to re-evaluate our understanding of the complex interactions involved within the global carbon (C) cycle. C stored within marine sediments have previously been largely overlooked and unaccounted for, despite their potential role in climate regulation and mitigation. Recent research over the past decade has identified inshore and coastal sediments as being significant organic carbon (OC) accumulation and burial hotspots, leading to the long-term storage of OC in these widespread depositional environments. In comparison, little is known about the potential vulnerability of sedimentary OC to anthropogenic disturbance (e.g., bottom fishing). Bottom fishing results in the resuspension of sedimentary OC, removing it from sites of burial and long-term storage. Once disturbed, sedimentary OC may be transported, consumed, and/or remineralised into CO₂. This activity may result in net changes of sedimentary OC, further altering the dynamics of the natural C cycle.
In this study, we use a combination of experimental procedures coupled with GIS mapping to develop a new methodology to estimate the potential vulnerability of sedimentary OC stores to bottom fishing pressures. In addition, we contribute knowledge about the interactions between biogeochemical cycles within post-trawl environments and examine pre-existing knowledge across various disciplines to better understand the long-term disturbance history of bottom fishing on marine sediments within UK waters.
This study indicates that sediments within the UK Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) have likely undergone significant physical and biogeochemical disturbance since the 1950s, particularly within fine grained sedimentary environments which have been determined to be potentially most vulnerable to fishing disturbance. The methodology developed in this study has allowed for the first complete OC vulnerability estimate of UK EEZ marine sediments and will likely play a significant role in future research and policy planning.
2023-03-20T10:40:33Z
2023-03-20T10:40:33Z
2023-06-14
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/27218
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/355
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/
2025-03-11
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 11th March 2025
Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
301
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/260592022-09-30T08:33:06Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2022-09-22T16:20:52Z
urn:hdl:10023/26059
Scotland's sedimentary blue carbon : new spatial tools for seabed management
Hunt, Corallie Anne
Austin, W. E. N. (William E. N.)
Demšar, Urška
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Sustainable Development
Scotland. Marine Scotland
Marine Alliance for Science and Technology for Scotland (MASTS)
Organic carbon
Sediments
Multibeam echosounder survey
Backscatter
Blue carbon
Seabed management
Spatial modeling
Marine sediments are significant long-term stores of carbon. Carbon burial within sediments has provided a climate regulation service over geological timescales. Despite marine sediments holding vast quantities of carbon, the spatial distribution of this carbon store is not well constrained. This information is critical to assessing and monitoring the seabed and in identifying carbon hotspots that may be vulnerable to disturbance and loss. This study focuses on marine sediments within Scotland’s seas. Scotland has a marine area six times its land area making it an exemplar nation to investigate novel methods to improve the spatial understanding of significant sedimentary carbon stores. Here, a novel methodology has been developed that uses multibeam acoustic backscatter data to map surficial sedimentary organic carbon and quantify surface stocks within a model fjordic system. In the proof-of-concept study, a strong correlation between sediment type, backscatter intensity, and organic carbon was found. The heterogeneous nature of the seabed within fjords was highlighted with implications for carbon storage, supporting the need for a greater spatial understanding of marine sediments in carbon accounting. A further study tested the opportunities and limitations of the wider application of backscatter to map sedimentary organic carbon in different coastal settings, potentially providing a cost-effective mapping tool. Results from this project also highlighted the role of estuaries on the east coast of Scotland in delivering significant amounts of terrestrial carbon to inshore sediments. Quality assessments of this organic carbon within shelf sediments indicated that remineralisation losses due to disturbance may be minimal, however anthropogenic pressures on the seabed can affect the burial potential of sediments, thereby limiting the ability of the seabed to provide climate benefits. The findings from this research can be used to provide tools to decision-makers to identify vulnerable carbon stores on the seabed, address evidence gaps relating to the transfer of carbon between ecosystems and implement targeted spatial interventions for their protection.
2022-09-22T16:20:52Z
2022-09-22T16:20:52Z
2022-11-29
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/26059
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/203
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
2024-08-23
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 23rd August 2024
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
xx, 232 p.
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/265002022-11-26T03:02:03Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2022-11-25T15:06:23Z
urn:hdl:10023/26500
Associations between exposure to air pollution and health: A longitudinal study of middle-aged and older adults in China
Hu, Kai
Keenan, Katherine
Hale, Jo Mhairi
Kulu, Hill
Börger, Tobias
China Scholarship Council (CSC)
University of St Andrews
Air pollution
Elderly health
Frailty
Multimorbidity
Cognitive decline
Longitudinal analysis
China
The Chinese population is ageing rapidly, and older Chinese adults (aged 45 and over) have spent a
large proportion of their lives exposed to historically high levels of air pollution (AP). Previous studies
suggest that there is a strong association between AP and individual health outcomes, but most of
them have relied on cross-sectional measures of AP exposure and health, or both. These limit our
understanding of how short-term, long-term, and cumulative exposures lead to changes in health
outcomes. This PhD thesis addresses these gaps by investigating the longitudinal relationship
between long-term and short-term exposure to AP and the health of older adults in China.
The thesis uses two kinds of survey data and two kinds of AP data. The Chinese Longitudinal Healthy
Longevity Survey (CLHLS) 2011 and 2014 is linked with monitoring station AP data (used in chapter
4), and the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Survey (CHARLS) 2011, 2013 and 2015, is linked
with PM₂.₅ data that are retrieved from satellite data via remote sensing technology (used in chapters
5 and 6).
The main finding of the
first empirical chapter using the CLHLS is that increased frailty incidence is
associated with higher long-term exposure to AP rather than short-term fluctuations. The second
empirical chapter using the CHARLS shows that exposure to PM₂.₅ over 15 years is associated with
higher multimorbidity accumulation, and higher levels of PM₂.₅ are associated with a higher likelihood
of membership to both respiratory and cardio-metabolic disease classes. The results of the third
empirical chapter indicate that long-term exposure to PM₂.₅ is associated with poorer cognitive
function, but different measures of long-term AP exposure are associated with different levels of
cognitive decline. Overall, the three chapters indicate that long-term AP exposure has a negative
association with elderly health, but that there may be some individual and contextual differences
which are being conflated with these associations, and which deserve further exploration.
This thesis, therefore, makes several substantive and methodological contributions. First, I create a
unique longitudinal dataset by linking historical AP data to representative longitudinal ageing surveys
at the city level. Second, I investigate the associations of short-term and long-term exposure with health outcomes. Third, health outcomes of older adults are measured longitudinally using three
comprehensive indicators that can reflect the complex relationship between AP and elderly health.
The findings highlight the need to further consider cumulative and life-course AP exposure on elderly
health at a smaller geographical scale.
2022-11-25T15:06:23Z
2022-11-25T15:06:23Z
2022-05-04
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/26500
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/231
CSC No. 201703780011
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
2025-05-07
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 7th May 2025
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
xiv, 212 p.
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/178982021-03-22T17:10:48Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-06-14T15:51:35Z
urn:hdl:10023/17898
Adaptation to the impacts of climate change in small island communities : an analysis of Scottish case studies
Cunningham, Fiona
Stojanovic, Tim
Marine Alliance for Science and Technology for Scotland (MASTS)
ClimateXChange
The IPCC have identified small islands as high-risk settings facing adverse impacts
of climate change, particularly flooding and storm surge, with potentially
detrimental consequences for human wellbeing and livelihoods. The Scottish
Islands are peripheral locations that are physically exposed to storms and coastal
flooding; the frequency and magnitude of which are likely to be exacerbated under
changing climatic conditions. Key questions remain about the issues, capacity and
priorities of small island communities for adapting to climate change impacts. The
research seeks to review and develop theory on the scale of adaptation measures
and considers: the appropriateness of top-down versus bottom-up approaches
within small island contexts; the role of participatory processes and utility of
scenario-based tools in island adaptation; and the effectiveness of ‘one-size-fits-all’
adaptation planning where local priorities differ significantly. Communities in
South Uist (Outer Hebrides), Westray (Orkney) and Unst (Shetland) formed a
multiple case study approach. Policy mapping, documentary analysis and
deliberative workshops were employed to develop initial background
understandings of each case study. Empirical evidence was drawn from focus
groups (N=9) which explored local perspectives on issues and priorities for
adaptation in the case study communities. The findings highlight that place-based
issues and priorities exist within the case studies, with significant variation across
all cases despite the communities being of similar population, demographic profile
and island context. The research contributes to debate on one-size-fits-all
adaptation planning and supports the argument that national adaptation strategies
can only be effective in small islands if local issues are understood. The findings
support the integration of top-down-and-bottom-up approaches as a pathway for
effective adaptation in small island settings. Deeper knowledge of the interface
between community-based action and strategic policy in cross-scale climate
change governance processes is developed and there is scope to apply a similar
approach to understand adaptation planning priorities in other small island
locations.
2019-06-14T15:51:35Z
2019-06-14T15:51:35Z
2019-06-26
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17898
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-17898
en
xii, 256 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/281012023-08-05T02:02:36Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-08-04T10:29:48Z
urn:hdl:10023/28101
Title redacted
Fitzpatrick, Robbie David John
White, Rehema
Matthews, Iain McCombe
R&A Championships Limited
Abstract redacted
2023-08-04T10:29:48Z
2023-08-04T10:29:48Z
2023-11-28
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/28101
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/562
en
2025-07-31
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 31st July 2025
231
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/44712020-11-17T03:02:49Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2014-02-26T16:39:47Z
urn:hdl:10023/4471
Ageing and mobility in Britain : past trends, present patterns and future implications
Tilley, Sara
Houston, Donald
Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
Over the next decade the ‘Baby Boomer’ cohort will increasingly contribute to the proportion
of those aged 60 and over in Britain. The issue of how the mobility of older people has
changed for different cohort groups has not been considered in a historical context. Ryder
(1965) argued that cohort groups could be important in determining behaviour as have other
social structural factors, such as socioeconomic status. This thesis merges the disciplines of
transport geography and population studies using a novel approach of cohort analysis, which
has not been used widely for studying mobility trends.
Using National Travel Survey data from 1995-2008, the mobility trends of older people in
Britain are explored by creating pseudo cohorts. Pseudo cohorts are artificially created
datasets which are constructed from using repeated cross-sectional data (McIntosh, 2005,
Uren, 2006). This technique can differentiate ‘age’, ‘period’ and ‘cohort’ effects in mobility
trends. Age effects are differences in behaviour between age groups i.e. changes in mobility
associated with age itself. Period effects relate to changes in behaviour in all age groups over
a period of time. Cohort effects are those associated with behaviour common to particular
groups born around the same time (Glenn, 2005, Yang, 2007).
The influence of the Scottish concessionary travel policy on the mobility of older people at the
aggregate level is also considered using Scottish Household Survey data from 1999-2008.
This policy is very blunt and based on assumptions about older age. As cohorts differ, these
assumptions may no longer hold and therefore the policy may not be effective.
This thesis argues, using a longitudinal demographic perspective, that structural effects shape
mobility of cohorts differently over time. The findings reveal although mobility amongst older
people is rising in general, there would actually be declining mobility were it not for the
Boomer cohort. Amongst younger cohorts mobility is lower. The analysis also shows that
women travel further than men, a fundamental break with the past, specific to this generation.
This thesis illustrates the importance of cohort membership in explaining mobility change.
2014-02-26T16:39:47Z
2014-02-26T16:39:47Z
2013
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/4471
en
284
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/276582023-05-23T02:02:35Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-05-22T09:21:29Z
urn:hdl:10023/27658
Governing the High Seas : effective institutional arrangements for the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction.
Luger, James
Stojanovic, Tim
BBNJ
Effectiveness
Institutional effectiveness
High Seas governance
Forming almost two-thirds of the global ocean, the High Seas and seabed areas beyond national jurisdiction (ABNJ) support some of the highest levels of biodiversity on the planet. However, these vital areas are increasingly under threat from human and climate change-induced pressures. The current governance regime related to the conservation of marine biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction (BBNJ) is fragmented (in terms of institutional mandates, powers and resources) and characterised by significant gaps (in terms of species and geographical coverage).
In response, the United Nations has negotiated an internationally legally binding instrument (ILBI) to protect the High Seas. A key aspect of the draft agreement is that that new instrument should “not undermine” existing bodies, instruments and frameworks, which raises key questions relating to interplay between the new ILBI and existing bodies.
My research seeks to understand how the agreement can be effectively operationalised by analysing two related strands:
(1) The need for the agreement to be effectively implemented by existing institutions, and
(2) Due to the migratory nature of BBNJ and governance gaps, the need for existing institutions to work together effectively.
I argue under (1) that four candidate conditions are likely to be important for implementation and deploy Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) to identify one condition necessary for successful implementation (multi-party coordination) and three conditions (access to/management of data, multi-party coordination and adaptive management) which are sufficient to lead to a successful outcome.
Under (2) a case study of the Northern Atlantic institutional regime is used to characterise and help explain the forces and factors influencing institutional interplay.
Taken together, the two parts to the research generate insights into effective institutional arrangements for the future governance of BBNJ.
2023-05-22T09:21:29Z
2023-05-22T09:21:29Z
2023-06-14
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27658
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/473
en
264
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/62732019-07-01T10:11:24Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2015-03-20T09:13:57Z
urn:hdl:10023/6273
The subjective experiences of Muslim women in family-related migration to Scotland
Folly, Rebecca P.F.
Ferraro, Emilia
Reid, Louise Anne
Muslim geographies
Migration
Migrant women
Ethnography
Non-profit organisations
Gender
Feminist methodology
Muslim family members constitute a significant migration flow to the UK (Kofman et al., 2013). Despite such observations, this form of mobility is under-explored in geographic scholarship on migration. Accordingly, this thesis examines the subjective experiences of migration of a small group of Muslim women, who migrated either with or to join their families in Scotland. Participant observation, focus groups and the life narratives of eight women are used to gain an in-depth understanding of both the reasons for and the consequences of migration for this group of Muslim women. In addition, this thesis examines the role of a secular community-based organisation in supporting migrants in their everyday lives.
Drawing on conceptual approaches to migration, this study reveals diverse and complex motivations among participants in “choosing” to migrate. Far from “victims” or “trailing wives”, participants privileged their children’s needs but also the possibility to transform their sense of self through migration. The study draws attention to the struggles of daily life in Scotland where, bereft of extended family, the synchronisation of migration with childbirth resulted in some participants enduring years of isolation. Such struggles resulted in changes in the home, with husbands providing both physical and emotional support. The experience of migration affected the women’s religious identities, providing solace as well as a way to assert belonging in Scotland by drawing on Islamic theology. The community-based organisation provided a “safe space”, bridging the secular and non-secular and offering women the chance to socialise, learn and volunteer. The study shows that volunteering provided not only a way into paid work but also shaped women’s subjectivities and home lives. However, the re-direction of national government funding towards “Muslim problems” threatens to undermine the organisation’s ability to continue to meet the local needs of Muslim migrant women.
2015-03-20T09:13:57Z
2015-03-20T09:13:57Z
2015-06-24
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/6273
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
iii, 232 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/120522019-08-08T15:39:07Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2017-11-10T15:48:10Z
urn:hdl:10023/12052
Environmental conservation across ecosystem boundaries : connecting management and funding
Roberts, Michaela Holly
Hanley, Nick
Cresswell, Will
NGO Echo Bonaire
Environmental conservation
Environmental economics
Ecology
Caribbean
Environmental management
Invasive species
Environmental degradation is accelerating worldwide, yet environmental conservation remains limited by funding. Tackling this limitation requires not only absolute increases in funding, but improved prioritisation of actions. On a global scale island ecosystems are of high priority, with invasive species one of their most significant threats. In this thesis I investigate prioritisation of invasive grazing species control, incorporating ecological, economic, and social concerns, on the island of Bonaire, Caribbean Netherlands. To enable the trade-off of potential grazer control options for their ecological impacts I modelled the relationship between of grazer density and vegetation, and watershed vegetation and the coral reef. I found negative relationships for goat and pig grazing with grass presence, and for donkey grazing with ground cover. Coral cover below 10m showed a positive relationship to ground cover, and, surprisingly, a negative relationship to tree biomass. Because conservation action is most likely to be sustainable when connected to funding, I conducted choice experiments with SCUBA divers, which estimated a positive willingness to pay for reef health improvements achieved using terrestrial grazer control. Through communication with local policy makers and practitioners I identified three options for grazer control, eradication, population reduction, or fencing, and estimated costs and social acceptability for each option. Though the ecological models predicted eradication to have the highest impacts on the terrestrial and marine ecosystem, lower costs and higher social acceptability identified fencing as the most suitable option for grazer control on Bonaire in the short term, with the potential to be funded through a fee on SCUBA divers. Through linking ecological, economic, and social considerations within a real world conservation context I illustrate the importance of looking beyond only ecological improvements when prioritising conservation action. This research is directly applicable to policy and practise on Bonaire
2017-11-10T15:48:10Z
2017-11-10T15:48:10Z
2017-12-07
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/12052
en
xii, 246 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/168402019-10-18T09:13:10Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-01-10T16:38:10Z
urn:hdl:10023/16840
Title redacted
Sila-Nowicka, Katarzyna
Fotheringham, A. Stewart
Demšar, Urška
Marie Curie Initial Training Network GEOCROWD
2019-01-10T16:38:10Z
2019-01-10T16:38:10Z
2016-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/16840
en
Sila-Nowicka, K., Vandrol, J., Oshan, T., Fotheringham, A. S. and Demsar, U. (2014), Geocrowd - Geospatial data fusion, Technical report, University of St Andrews.
Sila-Nowicka, K., Vandrol, J., Oshan, T., Long, J. A., Demsar, U. and Fotheringham, A. S. (2015), `Analysis of human mobility patterns from GPS trajectories and contextual information', International Journal of Geographical Information Science pp. 1-26.
Oshan, T., Sila-Nowicka, K., Vandrol, J., Fotheringham, A. S., Demsar, U. and Pozdnoukhov, A. (2014), Geocrowd - Spatiotemporal patterns, Technical report, University of St Andrews.
Siła-Nowicka K., Vandrol J., Oshan T., Fotheringham A.S., 2014, The Use of VGI for Spatial Interaction Modelling, GIScience 2014, Conference paper
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
2020-10-26
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Print and electronic copy restricted until 26th October 2020
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
xxvi, 287 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/179852021-03-16T11:59:08Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-06-27T08:05:41Z
urn:hdl:10023/17985
The construction of success and negotiation of minority identities : a mixed methods study of the experiences and outcomes of school leavers in Scotland
Packwood, Helen
Finney, Nissa
McCollum, David
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Sustainable Development
Each year in Scotland, around 50,000 young people complete their secondary
education and leave school. This period of educational transition is laden with risks
and opportunities; significant decisions are made and life chances established.
This thesis explores the divergent educational experiences and outcomes of
school leavers in Scotland using mixed methods and is situated within debates
about structural inequalities in the UK.
Inequalities in educational achievement appear to be associated with three key
drivers, socio-economic status, ethnicity and gender. Most recent research has
looked at these factors separately. This study examines ethnic and migrant
background alongside other axes of difference in order to gain a more accurate
picture of the educational transitions of school leavers in Scotland.
The findings draw on repeat interviews with school leavers (n=34) in two
contrasting secondary schools over a period of two years. In addition, a novel
linkage of two administrative datasets gives a large sample allowing the analysis
of national trends in the educational outcomes of school leavers between 2006-2016 (n=471,317) with detailed ethnic and social stratification. Together, these
data provide a powerful analytical tool to interrogate post-school destinations in
Scotland.
The analysis of quantitative and qualitative data reveal new insights on the
significant differences in post-school destinations and aspirations depending on
ethnic and socio-economic background. For example, White Polish and White
Other pupils are less likely to go to University than any other minority ethnic group,
even once socio-economic differences are taken into account. Yet the qualitative
fieldwork reveals high aspirations and attainment within these groups.
This research raises questions about the persistence of educational inequalities
and illustrates how this is underpinned by the ways in which educational success
is constructed and measured within neoliberal educational environments and how
minority identities are negotiated in the transition to adulthood.
2019-06-27T08:05:41Z
2019-06-27T08:05:41Z
2019-06-26
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17985
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-17985
en
xv, 314 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/202202023-07-06T10:36:06Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2020-07-08T15:50:51Z
urn:hdl:10023/20220
Title redacted
Hiles, William
Lawson, Ian Thomas
Streeter, Richard Thomas
Roucoux, Katherine
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Sustainable Development
Quaternary Research Association (Great Britain)
2020-07-08T15:50:51Z
2020-07-08T15:50:51Z
2020-07-29
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/20220
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-20220
en
https://doi.org/10.17630/b962ac81-f1a1-429c-ab83-5b8325e5f968
Data underpinning William Hiles' thesis. Hiles, W., University of St Andrews. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17630/b962ac81-f1a1-429c-ab83-5b8325e5f968
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
2025-02-10
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Print and electronic copy restricted until 10th February 2025
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
xxvi, 405 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/273822023-05-24T02:03:16Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-04-11T10:45:20Z
urn:hdl:10023/27382
Public preferences for wind, fracking and nuclear energy in England and Scotland : a choice experiment approach
Almeziad, Deema
Warren, Charles
Hanley, Nick
Borger, Tobias
Princess Nourah Bint Abdulrahman University
Public preferences
Willingness to pay
Energy sources
Wind energy
Wind energy
Wind energy
Choice experiment
Choice modelling
This study assesses public preferences for alternative electricity generation technologies in England and Scotland, in the context of the global challenge of climate change and the current policy debate in the UK. Specifically, the study aims to provide an insight into the factors that could potentially influence the acceptability of four energy sources (onshore wind, offshore wind, fracking and nuclear energy). The preference heterogeneity is then examined with regard to observable and unobservable factors (socio-demographic and place of residence characteristics, and environmental attitudes). The choice experiment method is employed in this research to elicit preferences for future energy policy targeting environmental and climate change conditions. Through an online survey, data are collected and completed by 986 respondents residing in England and Scotland. Three choice modelling techniques are used for analysis: multinomial and mixed logit models; latent class model; and hybrid mixed model. The results show a significantly positive willingness to pay for both onshore and offshore wind energy technologies and a significantly negative willingness to pay for fracking and nuclear energy. These general results are however heterogeneous and depend to a certain extent on sociodemographic characteristics, especially age, education, income and environmental organisation membership. Furthermore, environmental attitudes (considered as three dimensions: cognitive, affective and behavioural) toward the environment and climate change emerge as significant predictors of energy sources preferences. The results also show that English and Scottish public preferences need not be considered separately, as most of the differences between them are not statistically significant. Overall, the findings of this research are useful for designing optimal future energy and climate change policies, as well as raising the public acceptability for the development of alternative energy projects in England and Scotland.
2023-04-11T10:45:20Z
2023-04-11T10:45:20Z
2022-11-29
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27382
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/394
en
2023-11-08
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 8th November 2023
229
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/128152019-06-10T10:47:17Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2018-02-28T10:00:49Z
urn:hdl:10023/12815
Material geographies of the maker movement : community workshops and the making of sustainability in Edinburgh, Scotland
Smith, Thomas S. J.
Reid, Louise Anne
Clayton, Daniel Wright
University of St Andrews. 7th century Scholarship
Sustainability
Human geography
Craft
Community economies
Practice theory
Recent years have seen the emergence of a novel type of community space around the world, labelled variously as makerspaces, hackerspaces, hacklabs, Fab Labs, and repair cafés. These workshops, often known collectively as the ‘maker movement’, have inspired considerable speculation regarding their potential to prefigure a more sustainable economy, including a shift to localised and participatory forms of production and consumption (Smith and Light, 2017). Until recently, the social scientific work on such spaces has been sparse, especially in-depth ethnographic work, though scholars are increasingly turning their attention to them, particularly in the fields of design and science and technology studies.
This thesis, a practice-led ‘enactive ethnography’ drawing from three case study workshops in Edinburgh, Scotland, explores the question of sustainable development and maker spaces along two main axes: firstly, the emergence of sustainable practice in such spaces, and secondly, the relevance of such spaces to the cultivation of human wellbeing. The thesis is the first examination of such spaces drawing from developments in social theory towards relational materialism, more-than-representational approaches, and a focus on social practice.
It draws a number of conclusions. Firstly, that claims of an undifferentiated global ‘maker movement’ may be exaggerated: the grassroots participant-led creation of such spaces results in irreducible diversity and local differentiation. Secondly, while claims about the potential of such spaces for reconfiguring global production and consumption are overstated, when viewed from a practice-oriented perspective, the communities of practice populating such sites comprise potent and potentially-valuable crucibles of knowledge and materials. And thirdly, trying to move away from individualistic conceptions of wellbeing, the case studies provided evidence for the shared workshops playing a crucial role in the contingent emergence of participant wellbeing. These findings are further developed in tandem with a posthuman reading of maker practices, contributing to timely scholarly debates on ‘making’ and ‘craft’.
2018-02-28T10:00:49Z
2018-02-28T10:00:49Z
2018-06-27
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/12815
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
iv, 335 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/294382024-03-07T03:07:08Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2024-03-06T09:19:26Z
urn:hdl:10023/29438
Marine protection in the European Union : how do social constructions of marine wilderness and nature influence policy?
Gorjanc, Sašo
Stojanovic, Tim
Warren, Charles
Republic of Slovenia. Public Scholarship, Development and Disability Maintenance Fund. Ad Futura Scholarship
University of St Andrews. Robertson Trust Scholarship
EU
Wilderness
Policy
Social constructions
Biodiversity
Marine
Conservation
Marine biodiversity is diminishing globally. Due to the extent and transboundary nature of the seas, effective conservation can best be achieved through international cooperation and policies. The European Union (EU) has developed some of the most stringent, but also complex marine environmental policy frameworks in the world. However, their implementation has remained inconsistent and poorly coordinated. The gravity of the biodiversity crisis requires better implementation of policy objectives, if current targets are to be achieved. While most previous research has focussed on provision of better data and on supporting coordination activities, this study focusses on the social constructions held by key actors involved in EU policy interpretation and implementation. The new generation of ambitious EU conservation targets often provokes contentious ideas linked to the resurgence of wilderness discourses. This study combined three major phases of research to understand these issues. Firstly, a combination of interviews, literature and EU policy analysis were used to explore how key EU policy actors perceive the concepts of marine nature and wilderness, what their personal policy priorities are and why. Secondly, a Q methodological study identified the prevailing social constructions among policy actors. Thirdly, the identified social constructions were subsequently explored and validated further in Living Q workshops with key actors representing all EU Regional Seas. The thesis explores the differing social constructions of marine wilderness and nature amongst policy actors, and how these shape and are shaped by EU policies designed to achieve strict or effective protection of marine nature. The research revealed six distinct social constructions, and considerable divergence between the discourses used in policy texts and those employed by the key actors. The influence of these six social constructions on the understandings of science-policy interfaces and policy implementation are discussed. The results highlight a considerable challenge for the future implementation of EU marine conservation policies, and the thesis argues that this underlying diversity of perceptions needs to be recognised and engaged with.
2024-03-06T09:19:26Z
2024-03-06T09:19:26Z
2024-06-14
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/29438
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/809
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
297
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/177922021-02-24T16:21:33Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-05-31T14:43:06Z
urn:hdl:10023/17792
Quantification of the effects of ocean acidification on benthic foraminifera
Guamán Guevara, Luis Fabricio
Austin, W. E. N. (William E. N.)
Streeter, Richard Thomas
Ecuador. Secretaría de Educación Superior, Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación
Ocean acidification
pH
Benthic foraminifera
Calcium carbonate
Survival rates
Growth
Calcification
CO₂
Mesocosm
Morphology
Dissolution
Carbon cycling
CaCO₃ production
Coastal waters
Vulnerability
Benthic habitats
Mid-latitude marine environments
Climate change
The global ocean has experienced an alteration of its seawater chemistry due to the continuing uptake of anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the atmosphere. This ongoing process called Ocean acidification (OA) has reduced seawater pH levels, carbonate ion concentrations (CO₃⁻²) and carbonate saturation state (Ω) with implications for the diversity and functioning of marine life, particularly for marine calcifiers such as foraminifera.
The vulnerability of this ubiquitous calcifying group to future high 𝘱CO₂ /low pH scenarios has been assessed naturally and experimentally in the last decades. However, little is known about how benthic foraminifera from coastal environments such as intertidal environments will respond to the effects of OA projected by the end of the century.
This research aimed to quantify the effects of OA on a series of biological parameters measured on the benthic foraminifera 𝘌𝘭𝘱𝘩𝘪𝘥𝘪𝘶𝘮 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘢𝘮𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘪 and 𝘏𝘢𝘺𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘢 𝘨𝘦𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘢 through a laboratory-based experimental approach where future scenarios of a high CO₂ atmosphere and low seawater pH were explored.
Experimental evidence revealed that survival rates, test weight and size-normalized weight (SNW) of 𝘌. 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘢𝘮𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘪 were negatively affected by OA. Whereas 𝘏. 𝘨𝘦𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘢 was positively affected (i.e. enhanced growth rates) showing a species-specific response to OA at 13°C. However, the combined effect of OA and temperature (15°C) reduced survival and growth rates for 𝘌𝘭𝘱𝘩𝘪𝘥𝘪𝘶𝘮 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘢𝘮𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘪 and 𝘏𝘢𝘺𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘢 𝘨𝘦𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘢.
Test morphology (i.e. test surface and feeding ornamentation) of live 𝘌. 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘢𝘮𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘪 and 𝘏. 𝘨𝘦𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘢 were severely affected after 6 weeks by OA, negatively influencing the uptake of 13C-labelled diatoms of 𝘕𝘢𝘷𝘪𝘤𝘶𝘭𝘢 𝘴𝘱., notably for 𝘌. 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘢𝘮𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘪.
Test dissolution rates were enhanced by OA and negatively affected foraminiferal morphology of recently dead assemblages with implications for net accumulation and preservation. These results imply that the long-term storage of inorganic carbon and cycling of carbon in coastal benthic ecosystems will be considerably altered by future OA.
2019-05-31T14:43:06Z
2019-05-31T14:43:06Z
2019-06-26
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17792
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-17792
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
xviii, 280 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/168122023-04-25T10:57:50Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-01-09T11:21:57Z
urn:hdl:10023/16812
New methods and applications for context aware movement analysis (CAMA)
da Silva Brum Bastos, Vanessa
Demšar, Urška
Long, Jed
Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico. Ciência sem Fronteiras
Movement
Context
Context-awareness
Movement analytics
Context-aware movement analysis
Recent years have seen a rapid growth in movement research owing to new technologies contributing to the miniaturization and reduced costs of tracking devices. Similar trends have occurred in how environmental data are being collected (e.g., through satellites, unmanned aerial vehicles, and sensor networks). However, the development of analytical techniques for movement research has failed to keep pace with the data collection advances. There is a need for new methods capable of integrating increasingly detailed movement data with a myriad of contextual data - termed context aware movement analysis (CAMA). CAMA investigates more than movement geometry, by including biological and environmental conditions that may influence movement. However, there is a shortage of methods relating movement patterns to contextual factors, which is still limiting our ability to extract meaningful information from movement data. This thesis contributes to this methodological research gap by assessing the state-of-the art for CAMA within movement ecology and human mobility research, developing innovative methods to consider the spatio-temporal differences between movement data and contextual data and exploring computational methods that allow identification of patterns in contextualized movement data. We developed new methods and demonstrated how they facilitated and improved the integration between high frequency tracking data and temporally dynamic environmental variables. One of the methods, multi-channel sequence analysis, is then used to discover varying human behaviour relative to weather conditions in a large human GPS tracking dataset from Scotland. The second method is developed for combing multi-sensor satellite imagery (i.e., image fusion) of differing spatial and temporal resolutions. This method is applied to a GPS tracking data on maned wolves in Brazil to understand fine-scale movement behaviours related to vegetation changes across seasons. In summary, this thesis provides a significant development in terms of new ideas and techniques for performing CAMA for human and wildlife movement studies.
2019-01-09T11:21:57Z
2019-01-09T11:21:57Z
2019-06-26
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/16812
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-16812
en
xxxiv, 225 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/173972021-03-04T03:06:28Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-03-28T16:30:24Z
urn:hdl:10023/17397
Sources, sinks and subsidies : carbon in Scotland's coastal environments
Smeaton, Craig
Austin, William
Davies, Althea
Howe, John A.
The rise of anthropogenic carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere has forced a revaluation of our current understanding of the magnitude and mechanisms which govern natural carbon pools around the world. A largely overlooked carbon pool is held within the sediments of the world’s oceans with the coastal oceans potentially playing a globally significant role in climate regulation. These marine sedimentary environments and fjords in particular are recognised as hotspots for the burial of carbon, yet little is known about the quantity of carbon held within such environments. In this study, we use the mid-latitude fjords of Scotland as a natural laboratory to develop new methodologies to quantify marine sedimentary C stores and better understand how these stores develop through time with a specific focus on the long-term linkages with the terrestrial environment.
The newly developed methodology has allowed for the first time the quantification of a national marine sedimentary carbon stock. The sediments within these mid-latitude fjords hold a quantity of carbon comparable in magnitude to most terrestrial environments in Scotland. However, when area-normalised comparisons are made, these mid-latitude fjords are significantly more effective as C stores than their terrestrial counterparts, including Scottish peatlands. Additionally; our understanding of the long-term role of the terrestrial environment in the development of these systems has been significantly improved with it being estimate that approximately half the carbon held within Scottish fjords is terrestrial in origin. Through the Holocene fjordic sediments have been shown too adapted to increased carbon input through increasing the rate at which carbon in buried, going forward this will be highly significant in mitigating the impact of predicated climatic and human induced environmental change.
This project has highlighted the importance of understanding carbon held within marine and coastal sediments. By increasing our understanding of such coastal sedimentary carbon stores we will be better able to estimate the global carbon burial rates and storage further constraining the their role in the global carbon cycle.
2019-03-28T16:30:24Z
2019-03-28T16:30:24Z
2018
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17397
en
261
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/34762019-07-01T10:11:08Zcom_10023_71com_10023_24com_10023_1943col_10023_73col_10023_1945
2013-04-11T11:09:21Z
urn:hdl:10023/3476
Residential mobility desires and behaviour over the life course : linking lives through time
Coulter, Rory
van Ham, Maarten
Findlay, Allan M.
Residential mobility
Migration
Moving desires
Life course
Longitudinal analysis
As residential mobility recursively links individual life courses and the characteristics of places, it is unsurprising that geographers have long sought to understand how people make moving decisions. However, much of our knowledge of residential mobility processes derives from cross-sectional analyses of either mobility decision-making or moving events. Comparatively few studies have linked these separate literatures by analysing how residential (im)mobility decisions unfold over time within particular biographical, household and spatio-temporal contexts. This is problematic, as life course theories suggest that people frequently do not act in accordance with their underlying moving desires. To evaluate the extent to which residential (im)mobility is volitional or the product of constraints therefore requires a longitudinal approach linking moving desires to subsequent moving behaviour.
This thesis develops this longitudinal perspective through four linked empirical studies, which each use British Household Panel Survey data to analyse how the life course context affects the expression and realisation of moving desires. The first study investigates how people make moving decisions in different ways in response to different motivations, triggers and life events. The second study harnesses the concept of ‘linked lives’, exploring the extent to which the likelihood of realising a desire to move is dependent upon the desires of a person’s partner. The third study analyses the biographical dimension of mobility decision-making, investigating how the long-term trajectories of life course careers are associated with particular mobility biographies. The final empirical chapter develops these insights, exploring the duration and abandonment of moving desires. Taken together, these studies test and extend conceptual models of mobility decision-making by empirically engaging with neglected facets of life course theories. Fundamentally, the thesis uncovers how aggregate mobility patterns are produced by the interactions between individual choices and multi-scalar constraints.
2013-04-11T11:09:21Z
2013-04-11T11:09:21Z
2013-06
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/3476
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported
267
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
Centre for Housing Research; Department of Geography and Sustainable Development
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/152942019-03-29T15:28:19Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2018-07-12T09:56:32Z
urn:hdl:10023/15294
The effect of the national institutional environment on business recipes: comparative case studies of ESSO in Britain and Germany
Hanemann, Sibylle
Nutley, Sandra M.
The increasing globalisation of business activities since the Second World War might seem to indicate the end of economic diversity within and among nations, and to point towards the standardisation of business recipes across the industrialised world. However, various cross-cultural studies have revealed considerable differences among organisations even within the fairly narrow context of Europe (for example. Lane, 1989; 1992), which are attributed to differences in the institutional environments in which the organisations are embedded. Institutional theorists argue that contingency theorists' emphasis on the influence of the task environment of an organisation, and cultural theorists' focus on the influence of ideational factors, are not sufficient to explain the continuing diversity of organisations across nations. This research analyses the influence of the institutional environment on the business recipe of private sector organisations. It thus combines institutional theories of organisations and the concept of business recipes. The companies analysed are Esso in Britain and Germany. Given that Esso in both countries is part of the Exxon Corporation, the research not only considers the influence of the national institutional environment, but also offers insights into the workings of a multinational organisation. In-depth case studies of both companies were undertaken by way of interviews and documentary research. These case studies were contextualised by research into areas such as the nature of the petroleum industry, the economic context of the companies, and the history and policy of Exxon Corporation. The case studies reveal that despite each company's common dependence on Exxon and a fair degree of similarity in the technical factors of their environments, they have distinctive features in their business recipes, and these can be attributed to the configurations of the respective institutional environments. The study illustrates the need for the managers to cope with conflicting institutional pressures, especially from their parent company and the national institutional context. Overall, the findings support the view of institutional theorists (for example Lane, 1989; Whitley, 1992a) that economic diversity among countries will persist as long as the configurations of key national institutions differ.
2018-07-12T09:56:32Z
2018-07-12T09:56:32Z
1997
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/15294
en
257 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/280832023-08-03T02:05:28Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-08-02T10:25:59Z
urn:hdl:10023/28083
Seeing the wood for the trees. Rethinking 700 years of vegetation change in Iceland using meta-analysis of palaeoecological datasets and landscape scale model reconstructions
Koster, Willem Wilmer
Streeter, Richard Thomas
Iceland
Palynology
Pollen modelling
Multiple scenario approach
Vegetation reconstruction model
Spatial bias model
Chronological quality
Pollen productivity estimates
Relative pollen productivity
The colonisation of Iceland around 870 A.D. saw the influx of Norse settlers to a previously uninhabited island, resulting in large-scale ecological changes. Human impacts on the landscape vary in time and are spatially complex, making it difficult to accurately assess how Iceland was affected.
To improve our knowledge about the spatial and temporal patterns of landscape changes in Iceland, this thesis uses quantitative approaches to analyse existing palaeoenvironmental data from Iceland. A meta-analysis was used to determine the spatial bias in and the temporal quality of Icelandic pollen sites. Relative pollen productivity (RPP) estimates are calculated for seven ecologically important taxa, by analysing pollen-vegetation relationships at eighteen sites. The RPPs serve as input for quantitative pollen-based reconstruction models, the Multiple Scenario Approach. Landscape reconstructions totalling 3825 km² were generated for three sites (Mývatn, Reykholtsdalur, and Skálholt) and three time slices (577-877 CE, 877-1077 CE, and 1077-1277 CE).
The analysis of spatial bias shows that pollen sites in Iceland are closer to farms and have a higher annual mean temperature and precipitation than a sample of random sites. The RPPs of Icelandic taxa are lower than RPPs in comparable areas. Different spatial patterns in vegetation cover emerge from the reconstruction model outputs, Mývatn remains wooded throughout the time slices, while Reykholtsdalur becomes mostly deforested from 1077 CE onwards.
The spatial analysis shows the need for thorough analysis of the representativeness of current palynological datasets, which helps identify where future sampling should take place to create more representative datasets. The characterisation of pollen-vegetation relationships shows that there is much more to be understood about the mechanics behind differences in RPP estimates in different
locations. Quantitative reconstruction methods provide a useful tool for gaining insight into differences in land cover changes in Iceland, and to visualise different spatial patterns in the landscape.
2023-08-02T10:25:59Z
2023-08-02T10:25:59Z
2023-11-28
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/28083
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/558
en
2026-07-26
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 26th July 2026
252
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/145712021-12-10T16:14:37Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2018-06-26T08:17:55Z
urn:hdl:10023/14571
Roles, rights, and responsibilities in the sustainable management of red deer populations in Scotland
Witta, Lorin E.
Brown, Verity Joy
Red deer
Environmental management
Wildlife management
Wildlife conflicts
Conservation
Decision making
Socio-ecological context
Scotland
Sustainable management
Human-animal relationships
Qualitative
Management perspectives
Practitioner knowledge
Policy vs. practice
Red deer management
The aim of the project was to explore the acquisition and dissemination of knowledge amongst decision-makers involved in the management of red deer in Scotland. While research exists on the ecology of red deer habitat, no research exists that focuses on the relationship between the deer and the people responsible for their management. Therefore, this thesis is primarily qualitative research which aimed to explore the various aspects of red deer management in Scotland within the socio-ecological context in which it exists. There are numerous groups with interest in red deer management, however this research, due to scope and time restrictions, was limited to two primary groups, the individuals tasked with implementing policy and the practitioners who carry out culling. During the course of the project, under-researched topics surfaced, highlighting areas of practical and theoretical divergence between stakeholders. This thesis therefore aims to explore how differing views and perspectives of two of the key stakeholder groups – the estate-based practitioners (including stalkers, land-managers, and land-owners) and staff of governmental agencies – influence the management of red deer in Scotland. This research indicates that people with different roles hold different relationships with the deer, which affect management decisions and implementation at local, regional, and/or national level. As with other areas within conservation and wildlife management, this research indicates there is a disconnect between blanket governmental policy and site-specific needs, with a lack of inclusion of practitioner knowledge. Potential future research would include additional qualitative research to follow up some of the management issues raised by this research and formulate recommendations for changes to practice, followed by collection of quantitative data assessing the efficacy of interventions.
2018-06-26T08:17:55Z
2018-06-26T08:17:55Z
2018-06-29
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14571
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
ix, 130, xiii p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/63782019-03-29T15:28:19Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2015-03-27T10:30:00Z
urn:hdl:10023/6378
Automobility and injury inequality : road safety for a diverse society
Pringle, Susan Mary
Dibben, Chris
Kesby, Mike
Transport for London
Road accidents
Teenage pedestrians
London
Ethnicity
Risk
Gender
Most knowledge of road accidents patterns derives from datasets. Heightened risk of involvement in road accidents can be shown to be associated with, inter alia, membership of minority ethnic groups and poverty. In addition, males are involved in a greater number of road accidents than are females. Very little work has been done to explain why these patterns should occur or why some places are linked to a greater risk of road accidents for specific groups of road users. This thesis adopts qualitative methodologies to examine reasons for the apparent over-representation in road accidents of Black teenage male pedestrians living in London, an exercise that not only suggests why Black teenagers should be over-represented in datasets but identifies factors that may explain the dynamics behind many accidents in road space.
The thesis focuses on the nature of road space as social space, and a road accident as a unique event that is brought into being through an interaction between users as they meet, each user importing his or her own expectations, feelings and interpretations to the experience. Data are used to argue that no one road user independently ‘causes’ a road accident and the thesis concludes that an apparently higher rate of road accidents involving Black teenagers is a function of the constructed social space of the road. Rather than anything intrinsic to the individual, the circumstances of a road accident involving a Black teenage pedestrian can reveal many tensions that underpin society. The final chapter proposes a variety of ways of tackling road accidents, concluding that to be effective, road safety programmes should be developed for diverse societies or communities, rather than discrete groups within communities.
2015-03-27T10:30:00Z
2015-03-27T10:30:00Z
2014-06-25
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/6378
en
Electronic copy restricted until 15th April 2016
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations
xi, 232
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/275762024-03-05T12:15:28Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-05-11T13:33:52Z
urn:hdl:10023/27576
An interdisciplinary study on Scottish saltmarsh blue carbon : data uncertainty and values in policy design
Riegel, Simone
Stojanovic, Tim
Kuhfuss, Laure
Paterson, D. M. (David M.)
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Sustainable Development
University of St Andrews
Thomas and Margaret Roddan Trust
Scottish Alliance for Geoscience, Environment, and Society (SAGES)
Scottish Government. Scottish Blue Carbon Forum
University of St Andrews. Robertson Trust Scholarship
Blue carbon
Saltmarsh
Ecosystem services
Climate change mitigation
Climate change adaptation
Carbon storage
Environmental valuation
Policy integration
The potential of saltmarshes to store carbon has recently been gaining increasing interest in the Scottish policy arena, particularly in the face of the recently declared climate emergency. Yet, while there are first estimates of saltmarshes’ overall carbon storage capacity, there is still significant uncertainty concerning the average soil depth of Scottish saltmarshes, and thus their total organic carbon stock. Moreover, other aspects, such as the value of the carbon storage ecosystem service and how it could be incorporated into Scottish policy, are under-researched. This thesis therefore takes a holistic and interdisciplinary approach connecting natural science, economics, and social science to investigate the potential of Scottish saltmarshes for climate change mitigation. A scenario approach is used to analyse the potential organic carbon stocks according to different average saltmarsh depths to reduce the uncertainty regarding the total Scottish saltmarsh stocks. A choice experiment was then conducted to investigate the Scottish public’s preferences and willingness to pay for the improvement of saltmarsh ecosystem services, particularly the carbon storage service. Furthermore, the experiment tests the significance of the influence of information provision on individuals’ preferences and willingness to pay. Lastly, this thesis presents an in-depth study on blue carbon policy integration based on expert-interviews to close the link between science and policy. This work suggests that even though climate change is a pressing issue, Scottish saltmarsh climate change mitigation contributions are comparatively minor and that other saltmarsh ecosystem services must not be disregarded to facilitate a prioritisation of the carbon storage service. In terms of policy integration, this means that it may be beneficial to integrate saltmarshes and their carbon storage service into the Scottish Marine Spatial Planning framework rather than climate change mitigation policy specifically.
2023-05-11T13:33:52Z
2023-05-11T13:33:52Z
2023-06-14
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/27576
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/444
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
206
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/291462024-02-06T03:06:30Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2024-02-02T16:29:21Z
urn:hdl:10023/29146
Investigating the dynamics of Greenland's glacier-fjord systems
Davison, Benjamin Joseph
Cowton, Tom
Scottish Alliance for Geoscience, Environment and Society (SAGES)
Greenland
Glaciers
Ice flow
Ice dynamics
Ice-ocean interaction
Fjord circulation
Subglacial hydrology
Over the past two decades, Greenland’s tidewater glaciers have dramatically retreated, thinned and accelerated, contributing significantly to sea level rise. This change in glacier behaviour is thought to have been triggered by increasing atmospheric and ocean temperatures, and mass loss from Greenland’s tidewater glaciers is predicted to continue this century. Substantial research during this period of rapid glacier change has improved our understanding of Greenland’s glacier-fjord systems. However, many of the processes operating in these systems that ultimately control the response of tidewater glaciers to changing atmospheric and oceanic conditions are poorly understood. This thesis combines modelling and remote sensing to investigate two particularly poorly-understood components of glacier-fjord systems, with the ultimate aim of improving understanding of recent glacier behaviour and constraining the stability of the ice sheet in a changing climate.
The research presented in this thesis begins with an investigation into the dominant controls on the seasonal dynamics of contrasting tidewater glaciers draining the Greenland Ice Sheet. To do this, high resolution estimates of ice velocity were generated and compared with detailed observations and modelling of the principal controls on seasonal glacier flow, including terminus position, ice mélange presence or absence, ice sheet surface melting and runoff, and plume presence or absence. These data revealed characteristic seasonal and shorter-term changes in ice velocity at each of the study glaciers in more detail than was available from previous remote sensing studies. Of all the environmental controls examined, seasonal evolution of subglacial hydrology (as inferred from plume observations and modelling) was best able to explain the observed ice flow variations, despite differences in geometry and flow of the study glaciers. The inferred relationships between subglacial hydrology and ice dynamics were furthermore entirely consistent with process-understanding developed at land-terminating sectors of the ice sheet. This investigation provides a more detailed understanding of tidewater glacier subglacial hydrology and its interaction with ice dynamics than was previously available and suggests that interannual variations in meltwater supply may have limited influence on annually averaged ice velocity.
The thesis then shifts its attention from the glacier part of the system into the fjords, focusing on the interaction between icebergs, fjord circulation and fjord water properties. This focus on icebergs is motivated by recent research revealing that freshwater produced by iceberg melting constitutes an important component of fjord freshwater budgets, yet the impact of this freshwater on fjords was unknown. To investigate this, a new model for iceberg-ocean interaction is developed and incorporated into an ocean circulation model.
This new model is first applied to Sermilik Fjord — a large fjord in east Greenland that hosts Helheim Glacier, one of the largest tidewater glaciers draining the ice sheet — to further constrain iceberg freshwater production and to quantify the influence of iceberg melting on fjord circulation and water properties. These investigations reveal that iceberg freshwater flux increases with ice sheet runoff raised to the power ~0.1 and ranges from ~500-2500 m³ s⁻¹ during summer, with ~40% of that produced below the pycnocline. It is also shown that icebergs substantially modify the temperature and velocity structure of Sermilik Fjord, causing 1-5°C cooling in the upper ~100 m and invigorating fjord circulation, which in turn causes a 10-40% increase in oceanic heat flux towards Helheim Glacier. This research highlights the important role of icebergs in Greenland’s iceberg congested fjords and therefore the need to include them in future studies examining ice sheet – ocean interaction.
Having investigated the effect of icebergs on fjord circulation in a realistic setting, this thesis then characterises the effect of submarine iceberg melting on water properties near the ice sheet – ocean interface by applying the new model to a range of idealised scenarios. This near-glacier region is one which is crucial for constraining ocean-driven retreat of tidewater glaciers, but which is poorly-understood. The simulations show that icebergs are important modifiers of glacier-adjacent water properties, generally acting to reduce vertical variations in water temperature. The iceberg-induced temperature changes will generally increase submarine melt rates at mid-depth and decrease rates at the surface, with less pronounced effects at greater depth. This highlights another mechanism by which iceberg melting can affect ice sheet – ocean interaction and emphasises the need to account for iceberg-ocean interaction when simulating ocean-driven retreat of Greenland’s tidewater glaciers.
In summary, this thesis has helped to provide a deeper understanding of two poorly-understood components of Greenland’s tidewater glacier-fjord systems: (i) interactions between subglacial hydrology and ice velocity, and; (ii) iceberg-ocean interaction. This research has enabled more precise interpretations of past glacier behaviour and can be used to inform model development that will help constrain future ice sheet mass loss in response to a changing climate.
2024-02-02T16:29:21Z
2024-02-02T16:29:21Z
2021-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/29146
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/729
en
https://doi.org/10.1029/2019JF005492
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-19805-7
Davison, B., Sole, A. J., Cowton, T., Lea, J., Slater, D. A., Fahrner, D., & Nienow, P. (2020). Subglacial drainage evolution modulates seasonal ice flow variability of three tidewater glaciers in Southwest Greenland. Journal of Geophysical Research - Earth Surface, 125(9), Article e2019JF005492. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1029/2019JF005492
Davison, B., Cowton, T., Cottier, F., & Sole, A. (2020). Iceberg melting substantially modifies oceanic heat flux towards a major Greenlandic tidewater glacier. Nature Communications, 11, Article 5983. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-19805-7
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
243
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/178212021-03-10T11:08:08Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-06-05T14:18:34Z
urn:hdl:10023/17821
'Tiny house, big impact?' : an investigation into the 'rise' of the Tiny Home Lifestyle (THL) in the United States
Carras, Megan
Reid, Louise Anne
McKee, Kim
Ellsworth-Krebs, Katherine
Tiny house
Governmentality
Sustainable housing
Affordable housing
Foucault
Great Recession
Tiny homes
Consumption
The burst of the housing bubble in the United States ignited political and economic shockwaves, bringing global financial markets to the brink of collapse and kick-starting the Great Recession. This devastating crisis was the result of irresponsible housing practices and policy interventions rooted in the contemporary neoliberal mentality of rule that encouraged homeownership and failed to regulate high-risk lending (Aalbers, 2015). The Tiny Home Lifestyle (THL) has gained popularity amidst this contemporary era of housing instability, and offers a small, more affordable, and often aesthetically appealing version of a traditional American home. Despite growing awareness around the THL, it has been neglected as the subject of rigorous academic study. Therefore, the primary aim of this thesis was to explore and explain the Tiny Home Lifestyle (THL) in the United States. This alternative, small-living housing option was positioned amidst the traditional housing market, debt encumbrance, and contemporary consumer culture, relying on the American dream ethos as a lens to explore aspirations of homeownership.
The conceptual basis for the interrogation of the THL was rooted in the Foucauldian (1988) notion of ‘technologies of the self’. This was applied to investigate the promotion of a self-governing individual in pursuit of being a responsible and ethical citizen. The methodological approach of this research was reliant on the recent turn in governmentalities studies that employ non-archival methods to explore the nuances of governing practices and actualities of subject identity formation. One key finding of this thesis was that almost all participants expressed financial freedom as the primary motivation for adoption. Arguably, these dwellers have been governed into taking responsibility over their housing and understanding the provisions of the THL as ‘more free’ than what is provided by traditional housing, rather than the result of a constraining neoliberal mentality of rule. However, data suggested that dwellers were active in this process and appropriated normalisation and differentiation tactics to responsibilise and moralise their decision to adopt this lifestyle and become ‘tiny housers’. This thesis demonstrates how an unaffordable housing market ignited new housing ‘choices’ and how dwellers shifted identities in this process, potentially altering housing trajectories in the future. This contributes to post-recession understandings of housing amidst the contemporary neoliberal regime.
2019-06-05T14:18:34Z
2019-06-05T14:18:34Z
2019-06-26
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17821
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-17821
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/
Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
233 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/172082021-02-18T17:07:09Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-03-04T17:04:42Z
urn:hdl:10023/17208
Investigating preference heterogeneity for restoring estuarine ecosystem services
Toledo Gallegos, Valeria Maria
Hanley, Nick
Long, Jed
Borger, Tobias
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Geosciences
Discrete choice experiment
Willingness to pay
Ecosystem services
Estuaries
Preference heterogeneity
Hybrid choice model
Hot spot analysis
Given the general decline of estuarine ecosystem services (ES), policy makers require to understand further the drivers and barriers to increase society’s support for policies restoring them. The objective of this study is to identify significant sources of preference heterogeneity for improvements in flood control, recreation and biodiversity levels, resulting from tax-funded restoration projects that would be developed in the Clyde, Forth, and Tay catchment.
We used data from a discrete choice experiment conducted in Scotland and applied several choice modelling techniques (e.g. MNL, RPL, HMXL, posterior analysis) to explore the effect of respondents socioeconomic characteristics, their latent attitudes and the local geographical context on their preferences towards policies managing estuarine ES.
We found a positive and significant willingness to pay (WTP) for improving all ES, although differences in WTP estimates exist for all estuarine ES, across catchments and between user types. Recreation values were found to be lower on average than either flood control or biodiversity conservation, while preference differences emerge due to whether people live within a catchment and whether they visit it for recreational purposes or not. People visiting the areas for doing outdoor activities presented a higher latent environmental consciousness attitude. Moreover, environmentally conscious individuals showed stronger preferences for management alternatives delivering estuarine ES improvements. Finally, the presence of significant local clusters of WTP estimates suggests that respondents’ preferences interact with their immediate spatial context. Nonetheless, the local clusters of WTP for estuarine ES improvements are distributed similarly in space regardless of the ES in question, or the estuary under consideration.
The research findings can be informative for designing more efficient and contextualised policies. Moreover, they can be helpful in raising the social acceptability of the policies aiming to manage estuarine ES in Scotland.
2019-03-04T17:04:42Z
2019-03-04T17:04:42Z
2019-06-26
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17208
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-17208
en
xxii, 282 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/284852023-10-04T11:17:31Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-10-02T14:53:46Z
urn:hdl:10023/28485
Patterns and timing of Holocene environmental change and carbon accumulation at Bankhead Moss, Scotland
Wang, Li
Lawson, Ian Thomas
Davies, Althea
Roucoux, Katherine
China Scholarship Council (CSC)
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Sustainable Development
International Peatland Society (IPS). Allan Robertson Grant
Abstract redacted
2023-10-02T14:53:46Z
2023-10-02T14:53:46Z
2023-11-28
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/28485
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/621
en
2028-09-29
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 29th September 2028
337
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/235052023-07-06T10:34:46Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2021-07-09T11:41:35Z
urn:hdl:10023/23505
Thinking energy ethics with care : citizens' perspectives on energy & the low-carbon transition
Damgaard, Caroline Sejer
McCauley, Darren
Reid, Louise Anne
University of St Andrews. St Leonard's College
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Sustainable Development
Energy ethics
Care ethics
Low-carbon transition
Q-methodology
Denmark
United Kingdom
Social science energy research is asking important questions about the social, political, and economic implications of energy transitions, and the consequent changing roles and relationships in the energy system. This has given rise to ethically and politically driven research agendas, for example around energy poverty and justice, as well as emerging conceptions of democracy and citizenship in the energy context. Within this scholarship, there is an increasing focus on the need to better understand how people relate in their daily lives, both to mundane dilemmas around energy use, and to bigger questions around energy systems and energy system change.
This thesis builds on these discussions with a particular focus on the concept of energy citizenship, an increasingly popular concept in both academic and political energy discourse. The thesis explores how a better understanding of citizens’ ethical attitudes towards energy might inform theorising of energy citizenship to better reflect everyday engagements with energy and energy transitions. To address this question, I draw on findings from Q-methodological research conducted in Denmark and the UK, and further reflect on the relevance of Q-methodology as a tool for social science energy research.
A Q-methodological study was conducted through interviews with thirty-nine residents in the UK and Denmark, in which participants were asked to consider a range of opinion statements drawn from public debates around energy transitions. Q-methodology was found to be a useful tool for opening up the complexities and ambiguities of the topic of energy transitions, in conversation with people of varying levels of energy knowledge.
The findings indicate that relational understandings of energy systems and a language of dependence, necessity and mutual responsibility are important elements in how people make sense of the energy transition and their place in it. This speaks strongly to recent advances of relational theories of energy systems and transitions, but calls for a recognition not only of inter-connections and relations, but of their ethical significance. To this end, I discuss the relevance of a care ethical framework for enriching our thinking around energy citizenship, and energy ethics more broadly.
2021-07-09T11:41:35Z
2021-07-09T11:41:35Z
2021-06-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/23505
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/94
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
viii, 232 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/178542023-04-11T02:06:42Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-06-10T10:54:41Z
urn:hdl:10023/17854
Foreign direct investment and South-South cooperation : negotiating space, place and power within Chinese FDI in South Africa
O'Brien, Liam M
Clayton, Daniel Wright
Kesby, Mike
University of St Andrews. 600th Anniversary Scholarship
China-Africa relations
International development
South-South cooperation
Foreign direct investment
Postcolonialism
Space and place
South Africa
China
Capitalism
Power
Aid
Chinese Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in South Africa is indicative of a two-fold transformation in the contemporary development landscape: the rise of South-South Cooperation (SSC) and a re-centering of economic growth as a driver of development. However, to attract investment, and accrue developmental opportunities, hosts must first offer an enabling environment. Where an enabling environment does not presently exist, it must be actively produced. This is undertaken by a range of actors and against multiple and contested priorities. FDI, therefore, cannot be understood without an appreciation of the intimate, yet understudied, negotiations over space and place.
Through the use of semi-structured interviews, field observations, and documentary analysis at the location of three differing Chinese investments in South Africa – including a Chinese SOE within an economic zone, a mining partnership with a traditional rural community, and a ‘new city’ development led by a private Chinese investor – the thesis asks how space and place is produced to support investment, the location of agency, and the limits realities place upon the role of FDI in SSC.
Findings show that, whilst space and place were often co-produced and actively negotiated between host and investors, motivations and priorities were aligned to a need to provide spaces of comparative and competitive difference within wider international political economy. The structural production of space and place in this way created new dependencies and further uneven development. This had implications for a host ability to develop in accordance with their own values and objectives. Conclusions suggest FDI in the development landscape limits the radical potential of SSC.
The thesis applies geographic theory in a context not yet seen and, through bringing together Chinese and South African voices in a single study, contributes original empirical data from underrepresented voices in scholarship on China-Africa relations.
2019-06-10T10:54:41Z
2019-06-10T10:54:41Z
2019-06-26
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17854
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-17854
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
[14], 236 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/271502023-09-08T09:08:40Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-03-10T10:25:46Z
urn:hdl:10023/27150
Borderwork in times of crisis? Control, care and the resource of emotion
Dowle, Lewis John
Leahy, Sharon
Kesby, Mike
McCollum, David
Scottish Graduate School of Social Science (SGSSS)
Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
Borders
Political geography
Borderwork
Sweden
Denmark
Refugees
Migrants
Migration crisis
Refugee crisis
Political moments
(Co)relationality
European Union
EU
Schengen
Populism
Emotion
Fear
Anger
Border control
Border checks
Identity control
Deportability
Asylum
Asylum policy
Malmö
Unaccompanied minors
Posthusplatsen
Mourning
Bordering
Debordering
Biopolitics
Acts of citizenship
Borderscapes
Securitisation
Sovereignty
Crisis
Europe
Syria
Syrian civil war
Islam
Semi-structured interviews
Discourse analysis
Care
Third sector
Charity
Agenda
Resource
Is this Sweden?
Suspicion
Civil society
Chris Rumford
Rumford
Humanitarian
State
Multiperspectival
Territory
Hyllie
Trelleborg
Danish
Swedish
Government
Sweden Democrats
Law
Governance
Swedish Migration Agency
Discourse
Immigration
Language
Narrative
Nostalgia
Parallel society
UNHCR
Border studies
Signal politics
Other
Pre-emption
Biometric
Dublin Regulation
Exception
New normal
Normalisation
Agamben
Kontrapunkt
Solidarity
Church of Sweden
Roma
Criminalisation
This thesis explores an internal EU border in Northern Europe during a ‘crisis’ scenario. In the aftermath of the Syrian Civil War, during 2015 Sweden received 160,000 applications for asylum, the third highest total number in Europe. Consequently, Sweden introduced three forms of border controls to restrict numbers, marking a significant shift in Swedish asylum policy. This thesis engages with the notion of ‘political moments’ concerning how occasions of heightened visibilities could be appropriated and brought into the political milieu in Sweden and Denmark during 2015-2016 and subsequently used in the operations of borderwork by state and non-state actors. Borderwork is understood in this thesis in a Rumfordian manner, where state and non-state actors can contribute to actions of bordering and debordering. The thesis analyses Sweden’s border controls, grounded in particular contextualities and operating within a specific EU legal framework. This thesis draws on semi-structured interviews with 53 individuals primarily from the state and civil society in both countries. Complexities within and between civil society and the state concerning borderwork are shown as being interpenetrating, and the state’s pervasive extension is explored through ‘the Snake’ and Posthusplatsen. Emotion as a political resource (which can be appealed to, framed and (re)produced to shape discourses) is analysed and seen vis-à-vis the political left and right as a mobilising force in both bordering and debordering. Finally, and as part of this, the notion of mourning is explored concerning the evocative question: Is this Sweden?
2023-03-10T10:25:46Z
2023-03-10T10:25:46Z
2023-06-14
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27150
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/337
ES/P000681/1
en
379
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/128632020-11-28T03:07:06Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2018-03-06T15:56:15Z
urn:hdl:10023/12863
Towards a holistic understanding of sustainability action : a life history approach
Gnanapragasam, Alexander J.
Bebbington, Jan
White, Rehema
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Geosciences
University of St Andrews. Student Services
Sir Richard Stapley Educational Trust
Environmental psychology
Experiential learning theory
Life history
Nature connection
Oral history
Qualitative methods
Significant life experiences
Social practice theory
Transformative learning theory
Electronic version excludes material for which permission has not been granted by the rights holder
Sustainability challenges threaten society and the environment with both formal and
grassroots initiatives to encourage sustainability action achieving limited success.
Contemporary policy approaches to sustainability have focused on individual
responsibility, promoting knowledge-deficit models of behaviour change that fail to take
into account the context in which people live. This thesis employed a life history
approach to holistically examine the relationships between experience, connection and
sustainability action. The roles of experience and transformation in changing
participants’ connection to self, other people and the more-than-human natural world
were investigated. A framework was developed from psychology and sociology
literatures to holistically elucidate the context in which sustainability action takes place.
Thirty-three participants were recruited from educational and environmental sectors
across Scotland and England. Life history interview data were thematically analysed with
emphasis placed on delineating experiences that participants described as formative, as
well as identifying temporal trends both within individual lives and across the dataset.
Experience was instrumental in the creation and reformation of the different
ways of knowing required for both connection and action. Extended periods of time
spent with people or nature were associated with holistic descriptions of connection.
However, the role of infrastructure in supporting sustainability action should not be
underestimated. The life history method illuminated the interplay between temporal
changes at personal and societal levels. These findings promote the current research
agenda into examining sustainability action within the broader context of the life course.
Although connection is instrumental in imbuing experience with the meaning necessary
to sustain action over a prolonged period, the wider context in which action takes place
can supress this effect. If policy is to be conducive to sustainability, it should focus on
creating and sustaining environments in which connection to the self, other people and
the more-than-human natural world are enabled and nurtured.
2018-03-06T15:56:15Z
2018-03-06T15:56:15Z
2016-06-22
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/12863
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
xiv, 330 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/85062019-03-29T15:28:23Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2016-03-29T12:05:48Z
urn:hdl:10023/8506
Education for sustainability through action research: an exploration through theory, policy and practice in Scottish secondary schools
Lloyd, Zoé Alise
White, Rehema
Education for sustainability
Curriculum for excellence
Action research
Design thinking
Utopianism
Environmental deterioration and social injustice highlight the discrepancy between ‘educated’ and ‘wise’ and, by corollary, call into question our approach to education. In order to investigate how we might advance Education for Sustainability (EfS) in a Scottish secondary school context this research engages with: relevant theory, the educational policy context, and practice in the form of two action research pilot projects. The concepts of utopianism and design are proposed as original and potentially useful to understand, guide and evaluate EfS and are linked to an analytical framework to clarify the concept of EfS endorsed in this thesis.
The analytical framework developed comprises four thinking modes: systems thinking; future thinking; an emphasis on values and priorities; and action competency, each qualified through reference to practice. The pilot projects highlighted the challenges of monitoring and evaluating; illustrated opportunities and challenges to deliver EfS theory; offered new theoretical insights into EfS implementation; and enabled reflection on the status of EfS in the wider curriculum. The challenge of undertaking action research as a postgraduate student led to critical analysis of action research in academia.
The thesis highlights the potentially promising policy context to facilitate EfS, particularly in Scotland, but also the practical challenges to implement EfS. Such challenges include: concerns over the clarity of policy documents; teachers’ interest and ability to facilitate pupil-led learning; and resources to support the quality of EfS being delivered. Recommendations for future research include additional classroom-based projects; policy implementation analysis; and investigation of teachers’ values, attitudes and capacity. It was concluded that utopianism, design, and the four thinking modes can potentially contribute to qualifying EfS in current policy and facilitate pupils to critique the status quo, and develop and share alternative visions of a sustainable future.
2016-03-29T12:05:48Z
2016-03-29T12:05:48Z
2015-12-18
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/8506
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
xvii, 413 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/102552020-06-04T02:00:26Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2017-02-09T10:48:10Z
urn:hdl:10023/10255
Discourses of energy justice : the case of nuclear energy
Jenkins, Kirsten
McCauley, Darren
Warren, Charles Raymond
Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
Energy justice
Nuclear energy
Energy policy
Socio-technical systems
Ethics
The energy sector faces sustainability challenges that are re-working the established patterns of energy supply, distribution and consumption (Anderson et al. 2008; Haas et al. 2008; Stern 2008; Shove and Walker 2010). Amidst these challenges, socio-technical energy transitions frameworks have evolved that focus on transitions towards decarbonised, sustainable energy systems (Bridge et al. 2013). However, the ‘socio-‘ or social is typically missing as we confront climate and energy risks in a moral vacuum (Sovacool et al. 2016). The energy justice framework provides a structure to think about such energy dilemmas. However, the full extent and diversity of justice implications within the energy system have been neglected. Thus, borrowing from and advancing the framework this research explores how energy justice is being articulated with attention to three emergent areas of growth, the themes of: (1) time, (2) systems component and (3) actor. It does so through a case study of nuclear energy, which was chosen because of its points of enquiry with regards to these three areas of growth, and its historical and on-going importance in the UK energy mix. Using results from 36 semi-structured interviews with non-governmental organisations and policy actors across two case studies representative of the nuclear energy stages of energy production and of waste storage, disposal and reprocessing – the Hinkley Point and Sellafield nuclear complexes – this research presents new insights within each of these previously identified areas of development. It offers the contributions of (1) facility lifecycles, (2) systems approaches and (3) the question of ‘justice by whom?’ and concludes that the energy justice framework can aid energy decision-making in a way that not only mitigates the environmental impacts of energy via socio-technical change, but also does so in an ethically defensible, socially just, way.
2017-02-09T10:48:10Z
2017-02-09T10:48:10Z
2017-06-21
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/10255
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
328 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/270012023-04-29T21:46:53Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-02-16T17:26:16Z
urn:hdl:10023/27001
Modelling geomagnetic bird navigation
Zein, Beate
Demsar, Urska
Long, Jed
Safi, Kamran
Leverhulme Trust
Bird migration
Geomagnetic values
Navigation
Satellite data
Geomagnetic navigation is a complex process which has been studied in experimental behaviour and observation studies. However, to date there have been relatively few modelling studies, and all have used geomagnetic data that don’t account for fine-scale dynamics of the geomagnetic field. The objective of this thesis is to study avian migratory navigation using novel data-driven approaches based on high-resolution contemporaneous and co-located geomagnetic and bird tracking data.
Two different methods (random walk models, RWM and step selection analysis, SSA) were applied to evaluate the use of geomagnetic navigational strategies by migratory birds alongside geomagnetic cues (intensity, inclination), and to study the effect of abiotic factors on navigation. Both methods incorporated navigational strategies, which were derived from literature and associated with geomagnetic values. For RWM, these were translated into novel probability surfaces (represented as spatial grids) and for SSA into strategy-based covariates. I further investigated the effect of using higher resolution satellite geomagnetic data and found that models significantly improved with their use. Future studies of geomagnetic navigation should therefore use fine-scale geomagnetic data.
My studies suggest that the most simplistic navigational compass mechanism (i.e. taxis) based on geomagnetic intensity is a preferred strategy. This is likely the most energy efficient mechanism which is the least prone to changes of the geomagnetic field. Additionally, I studied two different abiotic factors which have been proposed to influence bird navigation: the time of the day and local structure of the geomagnetic field. For both, I found the first empirical evidence for their effects on geomagnetic navigation.
My methodologies can be used for direct comparisons of different species migrating in different geographical areas and to study interaction effects with other navigational strategies and environmental factors (e.g. wind). The thesis therefore has a potential for a high impact on the study of migratory navigation.
2023-02-16T17:26:16Z
2023-02-16T17:26:16Z
2023-06-14
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27001
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/288
RPG-2018-258
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
2028-02-02
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 2nd February 2028
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
177
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/284832023-10-04T09:51:12Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-10-02T14:22:09Z
urn:hdl:10023/28483
Legislation, governance, and ecology of aguaje palm fruit harvest in lowland Peruvian Amazonia
Macphie, Anna Jane
Roucoux, Katherine
Laurie, Nina
Davies, Althea
Miles, Lera
Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)
United Nations Environment Programme. World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC)
Abstract redacted
2023-10-02T14:22:09Z
2023-10-02T14:22:09Z
2023-11-28
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/28483
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/619
NE/R008531/1
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/
2026-09-20
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 20th September 2026
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International
239
The University of St Andrews
UNEP-WCMC
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/80632020-09-08T12:05:05Zcom_10023_71com_10023_24com_10023_1943col_10023_73col_10023_1945
2016-01-22T16:23:05Z
urn:hdl:10023/8063
The parallel tracks of Partition, India-Pakistan 1947 : histories, geographies, cartographies
Fitzpatrick, Hannah
Clayton, Daniel Wright
Historical geography
India
Pakistan
Partition
Empire
Colonialism
Postcolonialism
Britain
On 15 August 1947, the British government withdrew from India and partitioned the subcontinent to create two new nation-states: India and Pakistan. The Partition of India and Pakistan has been studied chiefly as a historical phenomenon with legacies that reach into the present. Questions of geography and space are crucial to this history, yet have hitherto received scant attention. This dissertation is a historical geography of Partition that probes the interplay of temporality and spatiality, and the historical and geographical layering, at work in the making of India and Pakistan. It treats Partition as both an event and a process, examining how the 1947 borders were rooted in a set of imaginative geographies and material geographical practices that were fashioned for and applied to the purpose of refashioning territory as part of a transfer of colonial power to independent postcolonial states and the making of new (national, religious) identities. The dissertation teases out the constitutive role of ideals and practices of territorial and cultural imagining, classification, mapping and boundary-making in this historical geography, but also highlights their contingent and contested qualities. It critically analyses and reframes Partition historiography using a range of theoretical literatures (especially critical geographical work on empire and strands of postcolonial and subaltern theory) that foster a sensitivity to the entanglements of power, knowledge, geography, expertise in the context of Partition, and draws on an eclectic range of primary sources, including the hitherto unused papers of the geographer Oskar Spate. Parts I and II trace strands of geographical and cartographic representations of ‘India’ and ‘Pakistan’ before 1947. Part III examines the geographies and spaces of the Punjab Boundary Commission of July 1947, in which Spate participated as an advisor to the Muslim League. Part IV points to the continued relevance of these geographies of Partition and their critical framing in this dissertation as lines of power.
2016-01-22T16:23:05Z
2016-01-22T16:23:05Z
2016-06-22
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/8063
en
2026-01-13
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Electronic copy restricted until 13th January 2026
xi, 268 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/63172023-07-31T13:37:16Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2015-03-25T12:26:08Z
urn:hdl:10023/6317
Carbon and the commons in the Zambezi teak (Baikiaea plurijuga, Harms) forests of western Zambia : sustainable forest management for commodity and community
Musgrave, Michael K.
White, Rehema
Scale
REDD
Miombo
Sustainable
Change
Livelihood
Governance
Land use
This study attempted a holistic synthesis of the problems of Sustainable Development (SD) and Sustainable Forest Management (SFM) in the dry deciduous forests of south western Zambia.
There are scale-based implications across the entire range of actions required for SFM and REDD+ implementation in tropical forests. Addressing scale mismatches in ecological, social and socio-ecological systems is essential and may help resolve epistemological differences in interdisciplinary research.
The importance of local context to SD and SFM supported a case study approach to the social-ecological system. Leaf phenology shows regional variation in deciduousness and varies spatially on a local scale. This highlights the need for researching the eco-physiological source of this variation to assess the effects of climate change on forest phenology. Livelihood analysis in forest communities showed that high levels of social and natural capital confer community resilience to climate change.
Land use change was mapped between 1975 and 2005. Zambezi Teak forests decreased in area by 54% between 1975 and 2005. However, changes in area weighted Above Ground Biomass (AGB) are negligible because Zambezi Teak forests are replaced by other woody vegetation. The differences in AGB between plot-based field measurements of AGB and published global biomass maps mean that these maps are not useful for REDD+ projects at the project scale (~10,000 ha).
Governance arrangements for Zambezi Teak forests differ between Zambia and Zimbabwe. Although the forests in Zimbabwe have an age structure skewed towards smaller age classes than forests in Zambia, possibly indicating a recovery from logging, this study has not accounted for other covariates which determine forest condition.
This research emphasises the importance of case studies for building a global database for inclusion in a meta-analysis, and for the contextual focus which a holistic approach brings to the action-based agenda at the heart of SD and SFM.
2015-03-25T12:26:08Z
2015-03-25T12:26:08Z
2014-12-01
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/6317
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-6317
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Embargo period expired, awaiting permissions for release of dissertation.
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
415
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/195782021-07-23T11:45:26Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2020-03-02T15:48:15Z
urn:hdl:10023/19578
Ethnic differences in health in Scotland : the contrast between morbidity and mortality
Cezard, Genevieve
Finney, Nissa
Kulu, Hill
Marshall, Alan
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Sustainable Development. St Leonard’s and Geography & Sustainable Development PhD studentship
Ethnicity
Morbidity
Mortality
Scotland
Health inequalities
In Scotland, most minority ethnic groups live longer than the White Scottish population but whether they report better health is unclear. Similarly, the international literature on ethnicity and health is divided between a strand that highlights the overall morbidity disadvantage in ethnic minorities and another strand that is puzzled by their mortality advantage. This thesis brings the two strands together by investigating whether ethnic patterns in morbidity and mortality align, based on a unique population source. The Scottish Health and Ethnicity Linkage Study links the Scottish Census 2001 to 12 years of hospitalisation and death records and provides a considerable sample size (4.6 million people) for this research. Therefore, this thesis makes a number of methodological contributions in addition to providing key empirical evidence of an ethnic morbidity-mortality paradox in Scotland. In particular, healthy life expectancy by sex and ethnicity is calculated for the first time in the UK using a direct method. Findings highlight the shortest healthy life expectancies in the Pakistani population contrasting with their mortality advantage. Hence, the Pakistani population experiences the highest number of years in poor health in Scotland. Indeed, the Pakistani population reports poorer health than the majority population which contrasts with their mortality advantage. This contrast persists beyond socio-economic circumstances and across migrant generations. Furthermore, using interaction analyses, this research demonstrates that reporting poorer health strongly predicts higher risks of mortality in minority ethnic groups but with greater strength for particular groups. Finally, findings show higher risks of (hospitalisation-based) multimorbidity in the Pakistani population which supports their morbidity disadvantage in Scotland. Diseases underlying this disadvantage include those related to the metabolic syndrome and respiratory disease. Policy makers should aim to improve the quality of life of the Pakistani population of Scotland while future research pinpoints the root causes of this morbidity-mortality paradox.
2020-03-02T15:48:15Z
2020-03-02T15:48:15Z
2020-06-24
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/19578
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-19578
en
xiv, 249 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/185172021-04-05T15:58:37Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2019-09-19T15:33:09Z
urn:hdl:10023/18517
Understanding socio-demographic change and sustainability in Scotland’s coastal communities
Duffy, Paula
Stojanovic, Tim
Laurie, Nina
Findlay, Allan M.
Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
Scotland. Marine Scotland
Coastal communities
Demographic sustainability
Migration
Residential moves
Mobility and immobility
Identity
Population change
The original contribution that this work offers is the understandings of demographic (un)sustainability of places and communities, and in particular, coastal communities with ties to marine related economies. This research considers population and social change in Scottish coastal communities using a relational approach and contributes to a growing field of coastal social research that seeks to inform marine planning policy. A relational approach was implemented by deploying a mixed-method research design in two phases. Phase one, applies a traditional population geography approach to develop a geodemographic profile, in order to characterise 149 coastal localities in Scotland. It builds on existing approaches by formulating a multi-level, dynamic typology. Phase two, focuses on coastal localities with economic ties to the marine industries. It employs a case study research design of three coastal localities (Banff, Cruden Bay and Peterhead) located on Scotland’s North East coast. The case study design focussed around the qualitative methods of in-depth interviews and ethnography, in order to explore the mobility practices influencing demographic change in the Scottish coastal context. The findings demonstrate the significance of local context, economy, opportunity and coastal identity to the socio-demographic sustainability of Scottish coastal populations, as shaped through the processes of mobility and immobility.
The approach has created a working definition of the social coast that is applicable across localities in Scotland, and can be deployed to provide a taxonomic analysis for use in policy and planning more widely. The research also addresses a gap in the coastal geography literature, which has previously focussed on economic or cultural identity of coastal places, by considering the implications of population change to the construction of coastal places. Finally, the thesis was responsive to the ways of knowing traditionally mobilised in population geography and was able to critically reflect on the limitations that underpin them within the research process. The relational, mixed methods approach taken enabled a greater understanding of the importance of context, and the internal relationship between the characteristics of place and a population’s capacity to ‘answer back’.
2019-09-19T15:33:09Z
2019-09-19T15:33:09Z
2019-12-03
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/18517
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-18517
en
2024-09-13
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Print and electronic copy restricted until 13th September 2024
xx, 332 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/206152021-08-06T14:25:19Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2020-09-14T09:45:22Z
urn:hdl:10023/20615
Government resettlement as participatory adaptation to climate change : exploring the role of knowledge in the Lower Shire region of Malawi
Nicholson, Hebe
McCollum, David
Laurie, Nina
Scottish Graduate School of Social Science (SGSSS)
Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
Resettlement
Climate change
Participatory
Flooding
Local knowledge
Technocratic knowledge
Malawi
There has been debate over how environmental change will influence migration. This
PhD explores one aspect of this: the impact of flooding on migration patterns and the
subsequent move by government actors to govern these migration patterns through
resettlement in Malawi. This research suggests that this move to govern migration reflects a
broader shift in the discourse of seeing migration as a positive opportunity and as adaptation
to environmental change. It focuses on the Lower Shire region of Malawi, an area particularly
impacted by flooding, and especially reflects on the participatory nature of the resettlement
process, as this is highlighted by influential international guidelines as being necessary for the
resettlement to be adaptive rather than mal-adaptive. To this end the research focuses on
the knowledges involved and the varying power dynamics. Fieldwork occurred between
August and November 2017 and consisted of 48 Interviews and six focus group discussions
with three communities in the Lower Shire that had three different attitudes (unwilling,
undecided, and resettled) towards resettlement. As well as 21 interviews with stakeholders
in government and NGOs involved in these communities and in the resettlement process at a
national and district level. The data showed that flooding related movements already occur
in the communities but, due to the increasing severity of flooding, there is a growing desire
by those in government and NGOs to initiate their own resettlement. However, official
resettlement due to flooding is novel in Malawi, and there is confusion over what it entails
and who is involved. This appears to lead to a disconnect between Resettlement, established
by the government and resettlement, movements initiated by those in vulnerable
communities. The data suggests that a key reason this disconnect develops is due to the
different perceptions of knowledge. It appears that there is a subtly pervasive disregard of
community knowledge and this can reduce the community agency within the resettlement
process and prevent it from being participatory. However, the data also highlighted the
intriguing ways the communities themselves can re-appropriate resettlement to indicate
their needs in the process, illustrating the fluidity of knowledge and power within the
resettlement process in Malawi.
2020-09-14T09:45:22Z
2020-09-14T09:45:22Z
2020-12-01
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/20615
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-20615
en
https://doi.org/10.17630/6336d9c7-bb04-4a1c-b08a-8d1dde39c41f
Interview transcipts with stakeholders in government, NGOs and rural communities in Malawi (thesis data) Nicholson, H., University of St Andrews, 18 March 2020. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17630/6336d9c7-bb04-4a1c-b08a-8d1dde39c41f
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
xii, 274 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/292042024-02-28T03:09:24Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2024-02-09T16:27:30Z
urn:hdl:10023/29204
Asylum as artifice : the role of the 'asylum seeker' and the production of the space-time of asylum accommodation in Glasgow, Scotland
Pearce, Anna Valeria
Leahy, Sharon
Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
Asylum
Accommodation
Carcerality
Legal geographies
Migration
This thesis explores the relationship between the legal category of the ‘asylum seeker’ and production of asylum accommodation as space-time, through a localised empirical case study in Glasgow, Scotland. Administered by the UK Home Office and delivered by a private contractor, the Mears Group, asylum accommodation is here theorised as being a logistically defined and value-creating carceral space-time. This is constituted relationally and performatively, a theoretical composite of the work of Massey (2001), Delaney (2010) and Butler (1988). Such a theorisation is arrived at through a novel conceptualization of the ‘asylum seeker’ as an artifice, the site of a double real abstraction of legal categorization and commodity exchange, drawing on the work of Toscano (2008, 2012, 2014), Thomas (2021) and Sohn-Rethel (2021). The category of the ‘asylum seeker’ – the legal double of the real asylum-seeking individual – is constituted through three different levels of discourse: 1) successive rounds of asylum legislation since 1993, which has stripped away access to employment and welfare; 2) contracts for the delivery of asylum accommodation, which recast the ‘asylum seeker’ as a ‘service user’; 3) relationality and performativity of roles, which in turn constitute the space-time of asylum accommodation itself. Analysis of all three levels of discourse, understood to be in a dialectical, co-constitutive relationship with one another, contributes a formulation of asylum accommodation as a ‘parallel world’: a qualitatively distinct modality of space-time, ruled by legal and commodity exchange abstraction, which has the capacity to distort the semantic constructions used to describe it. This formulation in turn enables propositions concerning the role of asylum accommodation in wider migration management to be made, problematizing not only the organization of authority between the Home Office and private accommodation providers, but the nature of power itself in such contractual arrangements.
2024-02-09T16:27:30Z
2024-02-09T16:27:30Z
2024-06-14
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/29204
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/746
en
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted permanently
248
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/118522019-03-29T15:28:27Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2017-10-16T12:49:19Z
urn:hdl:10023/11852
Assessing the relationship between poverty and biodiversity, within the context of land use change in the Solomon Islands
Davies, Tamara Ellen
Dibben, Chris
Fazey, Ioan
Pettorelli, Nathalie
Cowlishaw, Guy
Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)
University of St Andrews
Chester Zoo (Chester, England)
Rufford Foundation
Lubee Bat Conservancy
There is convergence at the international level that conserving biodiversity can contribute to poverty alleviation, but empirical evidence for this relationship is scarce. In this thesis I assess the relationship between poverty and biodiversity, within the context of land use change, using a case-study from the Solomon Islands. This interdisciplinary study is based on both social and ecological data, primarily collected through focus groups, household surveys and avian line transect surveys. Poor households in Kahua were characterised by fewer members of a working age and fewer male members. They were also found to own fewer assets, which were correlated to lower land tenure. Natural resources, including wild foods, were a crucial resource for the consumption and income for poor households, with evidence of wild foods buffering shortfalls in household consumption. The livelihoods of poor households were dependent on natural resources, whereas wealthier households relied on cash crops. The lower involvement of poor households in cash cropping suggests that the poor have less access to such income sources, possibly through a lack of initial land holding assets. Cash crop areas of monoculture cocoa were the most intensive land use in Kahua and were found to be a poor habitat for many bird species, including most endemics. Overall, the relationship between poverty and biodiversity was found to be complex, context dependent and influenced by various social and institutional factors. Household inequalities in access to land and resources indicate that a social-ecological trap may be occurring for poorer households in Kahua, possibly perpetuated by the livelihoods of wealthier households. More research is required in translating the concept of social-ecological traps into management actions, but this thesis concludes that this could be a useful concept for improving poverty alleviation and biodiversity conservation initiatives.
2017-10-16T12:49:19Z
2017-10-16T12:49:19Z
2014-05
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/11852
en
xiv, 227 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/294792024-03-14T03:10:52Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2024-03-13T12:14:24Z
urn:hdl:10023/29479
An environmental cost-benefit analysis of LNG as a maritime fuel in the Arctic
Holmes, Ryan Thomas
McCauley, Darren
Hanley, Nick
Paterson, D. M. (David M.)
McLaughlin, Eoin
As environmental regulations continue to drive a transition away from the extremely polluting heavy oil based fuels traditionally utilized for maritime transport towards alternative fuels, liquefied natural gas is emerging as a viable compliance option. This transition is of particular importance to the Arctic region, where escalating interest in development activities pose significant risks to a relatively undeveloped, yet particularly environmentally vulnerable area. Due to the importance of the Arctic region to the global environment, the prospect of increased development activity and associated maritime traffic within the area has wide ranging implications extending well beyond the region. By taking into account the perspectives of governance actors at varying levels and through the use of cost-benefit analysis, this study will provide an evaluation of the environmental, political and economic implications of a transition towards liquefied natural gas being utilized as a maritime transport fuel in the Arctic region.
2024-03-13T12:14:24Z
2024-03-13T12:14:24Z
2020-07-29
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/29479
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/818
en
198
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/286322023-11-07T03:09:46Zcom_10023_1943com_10023_24col_10023_1945
2023-11-06T13:46:43Z
urn:hdl:10023/28632
Air pollution, health, mortality, and ethnicity: analysis of individual-level longitudinal and census data linked to high-resolution spatial data from the United Kingdom
Abed Al Ahad, Mary
Kulu, Hill
Sullivan, Frank
Demsar, Urska
University of St Andrews. St Leonard's College Interdisciplinary Doctoral Scholarship
University of St Andrews. School of Geography and Sustainable Development
University of St Andrews. School of Medicine
Air pollution
Mortality
Cardiovascular
Respiratory
Mental well-being
United Kingdom
Scotland
Ethnicity
Country of birth
General health
Limiting long-term illness
Long-term exposure
Survival analysis
Hospital admissions
Multilevel longitudinal analysis
Systematic literature review
Infectious diseases
Nitrogen dioxide
Sulphur dioxide
Particulate matter
High resolution spatial data
Data linkage
Census data
This thesis investigates the association between air pollution and health in the UK and examines how this association varies by ethnicity and country of birth. It links high-resolution spatial data on air pollution to individual-level longitudinal data at different geographical scales. The thesis shows that higher concentrations of NO₂, SO₂, CO, PM10, and PM2.5 ambient air pollutants are associated with limiting long-term illness, poor self-reported health, lower ratings of mental well-being, and increased mortality rates and hospital admissions. Particulate matter is mainly associated with all-cause, respiratory, cardiovascular, infectious and cancer mortality and hospital admissions, while SO₂ is mostly related to mental/behavioural disorders/suicide mortality and respiratory hospital admissions. NO₂ is associated with all mortality and hospital admission causes. The analysis further shows that non-UK-born and ethnic minorities report poorer health with higher exposure to air pollution than UK-born and British-white individuals. Ethnic differences are not observed in the association between air pollution and mental well-being. This thesis supports the association between long-term exposure to air pollution and poor health and increased mortality and hospital admissions and shows that the effect of air pollution on health is exacerbated for ethnic minorities in the UK.
2023-11-06T13:46:43Z
2023-11-06T13:46:43Z
2023-11-28
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/28632
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/652
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/
2028-10-27
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 27th October 2028
Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
417
The University of St Andrews