Bachelor of Arts, Wittenberg University, 2020, Political Science

Despite the scientific consensus that climate change is occurring, denial of this reality has persisted in the United States. While there are many possible explanations for this skepticism, one potential cause that has yet to be explored in detail is fear and its destabilizing influence on individuals' decision making processes. Prompted by concerns that addressing climate change will harm the economy, question free market ideology, and threaten the American way of life, it is argued in this paper that the emotional experiences prompted by these sources of fear can lead individuals to deny climate change. To test this hypothesis, National Election Studies survey data was used to gauge the covariation between climate denial and a variety of potential measures of fear. The results of these analyses demonstrate that both free market ideology and a desire to protect one's sense of American identity are associated with climate change denial, suggesting that these sources of fear must first be addressed in order to effectively communicate the risks of climate change to the American public.

Committee: Staci Rhine (Advisor); James Allan (Committee Member); Sarah Fortner (Committee Member) Subjects: American Studies; Climate Change; Political Science; Psychology; Public Policy

Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, 2024, Biology

Organisms are shifting breeding phenology and thus exposing offspring to novel photoperiods. Rising global temperatures are also expanding the growing season and changing the relationship between photoperiod and temperature. This raises the question of whether species' responses to photoperiod that evolved prior to contemporary climate warming could lead to maladaptive responses under future global change. In Chapter 1, I examined how photoperiods representing two seasons affected freshwater communities composed of amphibians, phytoplankton, periphyton, and zooplankton. Both gray treefrogs and green frogs developed faster under the early-season photoperiod, and copepod nauplii abundance also increased. While there were taxa-specific effects of photoperiod, there were no widespread shifts in community composition nor strong indirect effects detected across the community. In Chapter 2, I explored the carryover effects of photoperiod and temperature, as well as their potential interaction, on gray treefrog life history. Both early- and late-season (shorter) photoperiods and the warm temperature treatment increased development rate but had opposing effects on size at metamorphosis: the shorter photoperiods reduced size, and the warm treatment increased size. While juveniles from the warm treatment grew slower during the short-term growth period after metamorphosis, there was no effect on long-term growth. Conversely, juveniles from the shorter photoperiods did not grow differently from the longer (average-season) photoperiod during the short-term growth period but grew slower during the long-term growth period. Overall, photoperiod had stronger effects across amphibian traits than that of temperature. In Chapter 3, I investigated the effects of three photoperiod treatments on traits associated with overwintering ability in gray treefrogs. Juveniles under the late-season photoperiod exhibited dramatically increased cryoprotectant levels, greater cold tolerance, and reduc (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Michael Benard (Advisor); Elliot Gardner (Committee Chair); Diana Koester (Committee Member); Jean Burns (Committee Member); Karen Abbott (Committee Member) Subjects: Biology; Climate Change; Ecology; Freshwater Ecology; Zoology

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2023, Engineering and Applied Science: Environmental Engineering

Hydropower is a renewable, low-emission energy source that supplies electricity either in isolation or as a stable baseload to support other renewable energy sources such as solar and wind. As such, hydropower reduces the carbon emissions to the environment that would have been emitted if other non-renewable sources, such as the thermal combustion of fossil fuels, were used instead. Most of the greenhouse gas emissions associated with hydropower projects and dam construction are associated with the material used. Very few emissions are expected during the operation, making it a low-carbon-emission source compared to other alternative energy sources. Moreover, hydropower production is also associated with economic development. Globally, there is still potential for future hydropower development, and newer projects are planned, especially in South America, along with the Himalayan ranges, around the Mediterranean regions, and regions of West Africa. Developing new projects in these locations could uplift the local economy and support developmental activities at a low carbon cost supporting the goals of COP26. However, the global hydropower sector (existing and projected) relies upon surface water flows of sustainable and predictable volume, making it vulnerable to climate change. The natural hydrological cycle is disrupted by climate change resulting in changes in the volume, seasonality, and intensity of precipitation and, thus, the available streamflow. Moreover, the increase in temperature also leads to the loss of snow and glacier, which provide seasonal and permanent storage for hydropower projects in higher elevations. The secondary effects of climate change on glacier lake outbursts floods, landslides, and sediment load are poorly understood and often neglected in risk assessments. The overall impact of climate change on the hydropower sector is difficult to predict and not globally uniform. Individual (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Patrick Ray Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Amy Townsend-Small Ph.D. (Committee Member); Katherine Schlef Ph.D. (Committee Member); Steven Buchberger Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Environmental Engineering

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2022, Civil Engineering

The climatology underlying meteorological drought and pluvials has shown non-stationarity at decadal and centennial time scales, impacting the interpretation of these extreme events in terms of severity and recurrence probability. Combined impacts of anthropogenic climate change and natural climate variability pose a challenge in understanding regional characteristics of dry and wet extremes, potentially producing serious ecological and social consequences as engineering design criteria based on the climatological extremes of the last 50 years may not be representative of natural climate variability during preceding centuries or projections of climate extremes under future climate change. Assessing trends and patterns across various spatio-temporal scales (seasonal, multi-decadal, multi-centennial period at gauge or grid scale) can contribute to a better understanding of regional changes in hydroclimate. Especially, evaluating current or future trends within a longer time window can determine whether observed changes are within the range of natural variability or shifted outside this range. A typical limitation of previous studies is their use of a single type of dataset (observations, reconstructions, or simulations) with limited record period and the use of conventional trend analysis methods which assume linear changes between two separate time periods. Motivated by this, my dissertation aims to 1) analyze non-stationary changes in a meteorological drought index and its spatial trends during 20th century instrumental observation period , 2) integrate proxy, instrumental observed, and projected model datasets into a meteorological drought index by unifying temporal and spatial mismatch and minimizing unique biases, and 3) evaluate current and future changes in meteorological droughts and pluvial extremes in the context of a multi-centennial scale. All studies focus on North America or the continental United States, specifically. To achieve the abovementioned go (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: James Stagge (Advisor); Ethan Kubatko (Committee Member); Michael Durand (Committee Member); Gil Bohrer (Committee Member) Subjects: Climate Change; Hydrology; Water Resource Management

Master of Arts, Miami University, 2022, Economics

International efforts to mitigate climate change constitute a global coordination game between world actors regarding their contribution to and prevention of a warming global environment. While national climate policy decisions are likely focused on domestic political pressures, a second driving force exists in this international coordination: climate policy adopted by each individual nation impacts the inherent payoff of policy decisions available to other nations. We study this coordination specifically between the United States (US) and the European Union (EU). Implementing an event study approach, our results indicate that US policies which loosen climate protections are associated with decreased market pricing for EU emissions allowance futures, while the opposite is true for US policies which tighten climate protections. We interpret these results as suggestive evidence that markets perceive the US and the EU to engage in a common interest game with respect to climate policy in which their policy decisions are strategic complements.

Committee: David Lindequist (Advisor); Nam Vu (Committee Member); Jing Li (Committee Member) Subjects: Climate Change; Economics; Environmental Economics; Finance

Master of Science, University of Toledo, 2022, Biology (Ecology)

Atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations are increasing and may exceed 800 ppm by 2100. This is increasing global mean temperatures and the frequency and severity of heatwaves. Recently, it was shown for the first time that the combination of chronic warming and elevated carbon dioxide (eCO2) caused extreme upward bending during growth (i.e., hyponasty) of leaflets and leaf stems (petioles) in tomato (Solanum lycopersicum), which reduced growth. However, that study examined only two levels of CO2 (400, 700 ppm) and temperature (30, 37oC) at the young vegetative plant stage. Further, they did not investigate underlying mechanisms for this warming + eCO2-induced hyponasty, which is likely to involve the plant hormones auxin and ethylene, based on their role in thermal hyponasty. In this study, warming + eCO2 hyponasty was evaluated in tomato across a range of temperatures and CO2 concentrations, and at multiple life stages. Ethylene tomato mutants were examined to explore the potential role of these hormones in warming + eCO2 hyponasty. Lastly, other species were examined to test the hypothesis that warming + eCO2 hyponasty is restricted to compound-leaved species in this family. At eCO2 (800 ppm), petiole angle increased ca. linearly as temperature increased from 30-38oC. Under heat stress (HS, 38°C), petiole angle increased at all eCO2 concentrations compared to ambient (600/800/1000 vs. 400 ppm). All life stages examined (juvenile, pre-reproductive, and flowering) had increased petiole angle in leaves developed during warming + eCO2, such that most leaves exhibited hyponasty in juvenile plants but only young leaves did so in adults (previously fully-developed leaves were unaffected). Ethylene-insensitive (nr) and -constitutive (epi) mutants displayed similar changes in petiole angle with warming + eCO2 compared to the non-mutant reference (cv. Celebrity), indicating that ethylene is not a main component of the mechanism of this hyponastic response. (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Scott Heckathorn Dr. (Committee Chair); Heidi Appel Dr. (Committee Member); Jennifer Boldt Dr. (Committee Member) Subjects: Agriculture; Agronomy; Biology; Botany; Climate Change; Ecology; Environmental Science; Forestry; Morphology; Physiology; Plant Biology; Plant Sciences

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2022, Geography

Improving tropical glacier modeling capacity is crucial for deriving climatological insight from tropical glacier fluctuations on historical to multi-millennial timescales and for predicting socially relevant glacier environmental changes under anthropogenic climate warming. Using the glacierized Queshque Valley of Peru's Cordillera Blanca as a case study, this thesis first develops data assimilation and calibration methods to adapt a coupled temperature-index mass balance and glacier flow model to tropical settings. The calibrated model is applied to project glacier evolution in the valley under an ensemble of climate change scenarios, confirming the high probability of near complete deglaciation by the end of this century. Despite the glacier's current trajectory, moraine features signal that ice once extended about 6km further down valley. Three cosmogenic nuclide dated moraines reveal extended ice cover at 10.8ka, 9.4ka, and 6.2ka BP, and historical maps show that the glaciers have retreated considerably since 1962 CE. Equilibrium experiments are used to identify all possible climatic conditions producing stable glaciers at the positions marked by the moraines and historical ice limit. Relative to the 1985-2015 CE climatic baseline, results suggest that valley temperatures were 2.9-1.9˚C cooler at 10.8ka BP and at least 1.0˚C cooler at 9.4ka BP. Proximity between the 9.6ka and 6.2ka moraines makes their climatic signatures difficult to distinguish. Finally, the equilibrium experiment confirms that in 1962 the glacier was already far out of balance. In summary, this thesis presents a data-intensive approach to improving model performance on a tropical glacier, enabling accurate ice loss projections, and helping to constrain paleoclimatic interpretations of tropical glacier geomorphology.

Committee: Bryan Mark (Advisor); Zhengyu Liu (Committee Member); Ellen Mosley-Thompson (Committee Member) Subjects: Geography; Geomorphology

Bachelor of Arts, Wittenberg University, 2020, Sociology

This is a study that looks at the environmental attitudes of students at Wittenberg University. The study examines attitudes and behavior through the lens of the theorists Vaclav Havel and Karl Marx. Participants were asked to take a brief survey that accessed their carbon footprint, asked them what they knew about climate change and how environmentally friendly they thought they were. Then participants were asked if they would be interested in participating in an interview. The interviews asked a variety of questions ranging from personal opinion on climate change to participants' actual behavior and included an education piece on what Wittenberg does for the environment. Through interviews and surveys, this study's aim was to find commonalities and differences between participant responses and their reasoning behind their positions and behaviors. The study found that many participants felt that they needed to be able to buy more or different products in order to be more environmentally friendly. The study also found that participants were greatly influenced by professors or classes to be more ethical in environmental decisions.

Committee: Nona Moskowitz (Advisor); Sheryl Cunningham (Committee Member); Sarah Fortner (Committee Member) Subjects: Climate Change; Environmental Justice; Environmental Studies; Sociology; Sustainability

Master of Science (MS), Ohio University, 2021, Journalism (Communication)

The public primarily learns about scientific information from the news media. These news media have been, unfortunately, found guilty of fueling: biased coverage of climate change, misinformation about climate change, and politicization of climate science. “Disinformation outfits,” who are comprised of industry actors, prominent climate change deniers, and their organizations also used or attempted to use the news media to discredit climate scientists with the goal of accelerating the level of public uncertainty about global climate change and slow action to prevent it. This thesis explores how the news media discussed a small but very vocal cohort of climate change denialists throughout the 1990s. The use of “fake experts” has been found to be one of the most powerful techniques for effective misinformation campaigns. This paper examines the inclusion of key climate change skeptics via quantitative content analysis in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Guardian, and The Times of London from 1989-2006. This paper also researches the prevalence of legitimization strategies iv that weaker parties use to amplify their messaging. The results find that skeptic inclusion was much higher in U.S. conservative papers than U.K. conservative papers. Left-center papers were more likely to include “compromised” scientists and discuss climate change controversies than conservative papers. Conservative papers were more likely to include irrelevant “fake experts” and actively misuse and misrepresent scientific information, as well discredit climate scientists. Skeptics were discussed more during years of particular significance to climate change history suggesting they were capitalizing on media opportunity structures. This thesis also found evidence of early “source hacking,” or the targeting of journalists to spread misinformation.

Committee: Mike Sweeney Dr. (Committee Member); Rosanna Planer (Committee Member); Alexander Godulla Dr. (Committee Chair) Subjects: Environmental Science; History; International Relations; Journalism; Science History; World History

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2019, Political Science

This dissertation responds to the global ecological crisis of climate change, showing how the temporal and spatial dimensions of the crisis challenge our capacities to imagine and implement effective political solutions. Rather than being natural limits, I argue these dimensions of the crisis are inherently social and political, derived from contradictions and antagonisms of the global capitalist nation-state system. I thus take a critical approach to ecology and politics, in the tradition of Marxist political ecology. I read Antonio Gramsci's political theories of hegemony and the integral state through an ecological framework that foregrounds the distinct roles that human labor, capital, and the state system play in organizing social and environmental relations. I develop an original conception of hegemony as a fundamentally ecological process that constitutes the reproduction of human relations within nature, which I use to analyze the politics of climate governance and climate justice. Grounded in textual analysis and fieldwork observations of state and civil society relations within the UNFCCC, I show that struggles for hegemony among competing coalitions of state and non-state actors have shaped the institutional frameworks and political commitments of the Paris climate regime complex. I demonstrate how climate governance reproduces capitalist political relations predicated on formal separation of `state' and `civil society,' and the endless accumulation of capital, thereby serving to reproduce, rather than resolve, the contradictions of the crisis. I then center my focus on the global movement of movements for climate justice. Using textual analysis and qualitative fieldwork conducted as a critically-situated, participant-observer of the climate justice movement at various sites, including the COP22 and COP23 climate negotiations, I show how the climate justice movement constitutes itself as a distinctly anti-systemic and ecological historical bloc in world p (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Alexander Wendt (Committee Co-Chair); Joel Wainwright (Committee Co-Chair); Jason Moore (Committee Member); Alexander Thompson (Committee Member); Inés Valdez (Committee Member) Subjects: Environmental Studies; Geography; International Relations; Political Science

Master of Science, University of Akron, 2017, Biology

Community structure is being altered by direct and indirect effects of climate change. Increasing temperatures can threaten community structure resulting in the disruption of interactions within those communities most sensitive to changes in climate. Among those communities at risk for change is the North American grassland habitat and its resident insect community. Climate change can potentially affect primary production and the abundance and diversity of both plants and animals in different ecosystems. Here we have used open-top chambers to study the impact warming temperatures have on the resident plant and insect community on grassland habitat in order to better understand how grassland areas are affected and may change as a result of global warming, and how climate change will impact the community and ecosystem as a whole. Results show that passively warmed open-top chambers have a measureable increase of 1-4°C in ambient temperature above that of the controls. Results also show no significant treatment effects of temperature on primary production, except for litter, and no significant effect on the abundances of the resident insect community as a whole. Interestingly, results do reveal significant effects of treatment on insect taxonomic orders and families as well as significant effects on the trophic levels within the grassland habitat confirming that insects are responding in different ways to artificial warming, which can ultimately alter trophic dynamics directly and indirectly.

Committee: Randall Mitchell (Advisor); Greg Smith (Committee Member); Peter Nieverowski (Committee Member) Subjects: Biology; Ecology

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2016, Geography

The glaciers of the Cordillera Blanca Peru are rapidly retreating as a result of climate change, altering the timing, quantity and quality of water available to downstream users. Changes in water availability have serious implications for ecosystems, human livelihoods and regional economies. This dissertation investigates spatiotemporal changes in the glacier hydrologic system of the Cordillera Blanca Peru. It includes three major components. First, I develop multispectral unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) and kite platforms capable of operating at over 5000m in mountain regions. Secondly, I deploy these platforms to investigate processes of glacier change and surface/subsurface hydrology within the glacial valleys of the Cordillera Blanca. Finally, I integrate UAV datasets with traditional field hydrology to improve our understanding of the spatiotemporal variability in soil moisture and its role in moderating groundwater storage within the Cordillera Blanca. I designed and deployed UAVs on multiple missions at over 5000masl in the Cordillera Blanca, Peru. After describing the UAV design in Chapter 2, this dissertation reports on results of four studies that utilise the UAV to address research questions within the region. Chapter 3 comprehensively assesses the accuracy of photogrammetrically derived structure from motion (SfM) digital elevation models (DEMs), by quantitatively and qualitatively comparing the data against surveyed GPS positions and LiDAR DEMs. Finding that accuracy is as good if not superior to low density LiDAR, with the high density SfM point clouds retaining unique surface details. Chapter 4 investigates the dynamics of glacier change over the debris covered Llaca glacier. I document the importance of debris cover and surface features such as ice cliffs in controlling melt rates. Average glacier downwasting is 0.75m over one year but is highly heterogeneous. Ice cliff horizontal recession rates of up to 25m annual were measured illustrating the i (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Bryan Mark PhD (Advisor); Darla Munroe PhD (Committee Member); Michael Durand PhD (Committee Member); Liu Desheng PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Geography; Geomorphology; Hydrologic Sciences; Hydrology; Physical Geography; Remote Sensing; Robotics; Soil Sciences; Technology; Water Resource Management

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2016, Geography

The use of fossil fuels is causing global climate change and other negative impacts on the environment. Transitioning to sustainable sources of energy will likely take decades. In the meantime, energy conservation can mitigate the e ects of climate change while the renewable transition occurs. However, energy conservation in many commercial buildings where multiple tenants share meter data is dicult because aggregated readings attenuate the connection between energy decisions and outcomes. Research is needed to study energy conservation in commercial buildings. This dissertation investigates building energy conservation using several methods. It uses a novel energy information system to investigate e ects of presenting building occupants with real-time energy information. It also uses survey and focus group methods to explore attitudes and knowledge about energy use on campus. Results suggest that providing building occupants with real time energy information can reduce building electricity consumption. This dissertation presents empirical data in an urgently needed area of research. It also expands the domain of building energy conservation research by contributing research instruments and methodologies.

Committee: Ola Ahlqvist (Advisor); Edward Malecki (Committee Member); Ningchuan Xiao (Committee Chair) Subjects: Geography

Doctor of Philosophy, Miami University, 2016, English

Composition studies has failed to offer any field-wide conversation acknowledging global warming or the part that our normalized pedagogical and theoretical orientations play in propping up the status quo. To be sure, composition studies did not create the United States' (or the world's) energy, manufacturing, or economic infrastructures. The field does, however, participate and benefit from these structures, and our disciplinary goal to exist at the forefront of composing—which includes both technological and cultural practices—means that we have a level of complicity that we have yet to acknowledge meaningfully. Composition studies' history is littered with aspirational forays into epistemologies that expand our thinking toward ecology (Coe, 1974; Cooper, 1986; Dobrin and Weisser, 2002), the environment (Herndl and Brown, 1996; Killingsworth and Palmer, 1991), and sustainability (Owens, 2001). These respective offerings did not necessarily compel different theoretical or pedagogical paths, nor were they necessarily directly responding to resource consumption, environmental degradation, or global warming. Our field needs a more robust, resource-conscious line of inquiry that theorizes the relationship between texts and resource consumption, recognizes that sustainable composition is concerned about production (of texts), understands that sustainability should be considered situationally, not as a God term, and rethinks the resource cost of composing. Shifting composition studies' framework from its dominant epistemological orientation (specifically social-epistemology) toward an ontological line of inquiry that emphasizes writing's material and resource choices can provide a path forward for compositionists who want to contribute to global warming amelioration side-by-side with disciplinary goals. Applying ontological lenses around the concepts of material lifecycles, coexistence, and our interconnected world can allow composition to contribute to global warm (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Jason Palmeri PHD (Committee Chair); Katharine Ronald PHD (Committee Member); John Tassoni PHD (Committee Member); Roxanne Ornelas PHD (Other) Subjects: Composition; Rhetoric

Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2015, Atmospheric Sciences

Seasonal U.S. climate division data (1895-2014) of temperatures and precipitation in seven chosen divisions are analyzed for trends and patterns of variability and for factors contributing the most to the variability of temperature in each season and division. The divisions are chosen to represent regions of the U.S. that conform to particular patterns of variability of the Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) in summer. Rotated principal component analysis (RPCA) of atmospheric and oceanic teleconnection indices, annual atmospheric CO2 concentrations, and time series of cloud cover and divisionally-averaged precipitation removes intercorrelations between these variables in each region. The orthogonal factors produced from RPCA are used in stepwise multiple linear regression (SMLR) to determine the explainable variance in seasonally-averaged daily maximum and minimum temperatures (Tmax, Tmin) and diurnal temperature range (DTR). Simple linear regression is used to determine rates of change in divisionally-averaged DTR, Tmax, and Tmin in each region and season. The major temperature trends found are accelerated warming of Tmin in most regions and seasons, no decline in spring DTR nationally, and similarities among the four interior/central regions. These regions are characterized by statistically significant long-term (1895-2013) and short-term (1960-2013) decreases in DTR and increases in Tmin, with long-term decreases in annually-averaged Tmax and in summer and autumn seasonally-averaged Tmax. The Northwest, Northeast coastal, and Desert Southwest regions experienced long-term increases in DTR and significant increases in both Tmax and Tmin. Variance within time series of seasonally-averaged temperatures is generally greater during warmer periods. Inconsistency in seasonal precipitation in most regions may be increasing in each region's wet season. Cloud cover is the factor explaining the most variability in DTR overall among all four seasons in Central Ohio (Ohio (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Jay Hobgood (Advisor); Alvaro Montenegro (Committee Member); Jeffery Rogers (Other) Subjects: Atmospheric Sciences; Climate Change; Earth

Ph.D., Antioch University, 2014, Antioch New England: Environmental Studies

The degree to which the climate continues to change will largely be determined by choices made by individuals and nations regarding greenhouse gas emissions. Many Americans engage in energy conservation actions. But, the political will in the United States to adopt emissions reduction policies is unlikely to exist without public demand. Therefore, public mitigation actions of individuals (e.g., contacting elected officials in support of emissions reduction) are critical to induce legislative response. The majority of individuals who are most concerned about climate change (the “Alarmed” segment) do not engage in public mitigation actions, but some do. The purpose of this study is to examine the social-psychological factors that drive the public mitigation actions of the Alarmed. This was done through a comparison of the original value belief norm (VBN) model to eight author-created models that added predictor variables to the VBN. The objective was to determine which model was most effective at explaining public mitigation action. Drivers of these actions were also assessed by comparing those who took action (“actors”) with those who did not (“non-actors”). Electronic survey responses of 702 Alarmed Vermonters, analyzed with structural equation modeling, revealed that the modified VBN that included four efficacy variables and descriptive social norms was the best fitting and most explanatory model. Additionally, actors had significantly higher efficacy scores and descriptive social norms scores than non-actors. Results suggest that individuals are more inclined to engage in public mitigation action if they feel capable of taking action, believe that their individual and collective efforts are effective, and think others are participating. Two core contributions of this study are: (1) an improved VBN model in the context of climate change, and (2) greater understanding of the precursors to public mitigation action. These findings have broad implications for climate c (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Thomas Webler PhD (Committee Chair); Anthony Leiserowitz PhD (Committee Member); Carol Saunders PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Behavioral Sciences; Climate Change; Communication; Environmental Studies; Psychology; Social Psychology; Social Research; Statistics

Bachelor of Arts, University of Toledo, 2009, Philosophy

Environmentalism, an ideology once vilified by whole swathes of the American evangelical community as pagan pantheism, has in recent years gained an increasingly larger foothold in the community. Prominent evangelical organizations and churches have drafted declarations expressing their concern for the deteriorating state of creation, denominational leaders are fervently promoting sustainability, and congregations are starting to reconsider their divinely ordained dominion over the earth. This thesis will explore this emerging phenomenon by examining these declarations as well as the scholarship of those evangelical leaders advocating creation care. I will provide a historical overview of such material since the 1970s, attempt to explain the factors that contributed to the movement, and explicate the philosophical nuances of both liberal and conservative evangelical treatments of the environment. Subsequently, I will offer an endorsement of a panentheistic, pneumatological, and pro-environmental evangelical framework that recognizes the pervasive presence of the divine in all life forms. This solution will build upon the liberal evangelical treatment of the environment isolated from the problematic notion of human ontology possessed by conservative evangelicals, while utilizing their shared theological language to establish a connection. I believe this modified creation care framework will stand supremely capable of catalyzing a shift within the conservative evangelical community toward an appropriate sustainability ethic, hopefully helping in some small way to stave off ecological Armageddon.

Committee: Benjamin Pryor (Advisor); Jeanine Diller (Advisor) Subjects: Philosophy; Religion

MA, University of Cincinnati, 2009, Arts and Sciences : Communication

The purpose of this study is to engage in a “rich…robust explanation of the communication practices that constitute, sustain, and transform environmental crises” (Schwarze, 2007, p. 92). In undertaking this task, I propose an analogy comparing Al Gore, an environmental activist, to a crisis manager in an organization. The focus of this study will be the ways in which Gore creates a sense of urgency while also mobilizing his audience to action. Combining the application of an organizational communication perspective, enacted sensemaking, with rhetorical analysis, this study seeks to build climate crisis communication theory. Traditional crisis management literature tends to limit analysis to the strategies used by managers to re-actively frame an organizational crisis. Al Gore represents a unique case study because rather than deemphasizing the crisis, Gore pro-actively constructs climate crisis through his public discourse. In this way, Gore enacts climate crisis management. Thus, this study represents an alternate application of traditional crisis management literature through the examination of the rhetorical techniques by which Gore continuously re-constitutes global climate crisis. Borrowing the crisis management terminology from crisis communication literature, I posit that Al Gore can be viewed as an activist crisis manager. Using Weick's (1988) theory of enacted sensemaking as the primary theoretical lens, Gore's 2006 documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, his 2007 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, and selected pages from the We Campaign website are analyzed as a sequence of public address, framing the crisis situation over time, while also constructing Gore's crisis manager persona as well as the persona of his audience.

Committee: Stephen Depoe PhD (Committee Chair); Suzanne Boys PhD (Committee Member); William Jennings PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Communication; Rhetoric

Bachelor of Science of Journalism (BSJ), Ohio University, 2010, Journalism

This thesis explores the extent and effects of militarized language in modern American coverage of climate change. Research on framing theory, metaphor theory, and militarized language provides background to original research about the form and prevalence of phrases like “battling climate change” and “war on global warming”. Articles from three leading U.S. newspapers published from 2006-2009 were analyzed for instances of militarized language and the use of specific words were tallied. Militarized language was found in 1.5% of articles published throughout the time period studied. Though there has been no apparent empirical testing on the subject, theoretical research described in this thesis indicates that users should avoid militarized language because leading scholars have proposed few potential benefits and many drawbacks of a metaphorical association with war.

Committee: Bernhard Debatin (Advisor) Subjects: Communication; Journalism; Linguistics; Mass Media

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2012, Sociology

In a provocative paper, Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus (2005) shook the environmental establishment by declaring that environmentalism had died, claiming that the movement pushing for global warming policies had failed because of their framing strategy. A content analysis of pro-global warming policy movement frames deployed in the New York Times from 1981 through 2003 shows support for their claim that the frames were largely technocratic and lacked linkages to larger American values. However, their claim that the movement has framed global warming as solely an environmental problem is not supported by the data. The pro-global warming policy movement first focused their frames on prognostics, or in other words the causes and consequences of the social problem, but after the issue arrived on the international governmental agenda in 1988 the movement's frames shifted focus to diagnostic frames, or solutions to global warming. Examination of countermovement frames shows that frame debunking fell into two categories: prognostic attacks and diagnostic attacks. The countermovement responded with diagnostic attacks when it mobilized in 1989 and in the 1990s gradually deployed prognostic attacks in equal numbers. Zero-inflated poisson regressions were used to test the sociopolitical factors accounting for frame deployment for both the movement and countermovement. Pro-global warming policy frames were found to increase in response to political threat, elite cues, and weather shocks. In contrast, anti-global warming policy counterframes decreased in response to political allies, election years, weather shocks, and elite cues. The agendas literature describes social problems progressing from the governmental policy agenda then to the media agenda; however I find that global warming media agenda access preceded Congressional agenda access.

Committee: J. Craig Jenkins (Committee Co-Chair); Andrew Martin (Committee Co-Chair); Edward Crenshaw (Committee Member) Subjects: Sociology