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No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) Tese_FINAL_E_M_SANTOS.pdf: 4993440 bytes, checksum: 8993e0b63f2bf7105d529160e1bab82e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-04-19 / CAPES - Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / The Tocantins State has the totality of its territory inserted into the Brazilian Legal Amazon and it has in it the small stream of Taquaruçu Grande Basin in the city of Palmas, a region of agroecosystems of familiar production and biocultural diversity. However, these agroecosystems suffered such important modifications with the creation of Palmas that caused reorganization and systems adaptability. The main goal of this study was to analyse the biocultural modifications of these agroecosystems which provide the maintenance of the biocultural diversity and the resilience for the sustainability. This study was based on an integration of qualitative and quantitative with the theoretical methodology of dialectics of systemic complexity, resilience of socioecological systems, ethnoecology and transdisciplinarity. The data collected indicated the triggering events of the changes over the trajectory of the studied area and the impacts of external factors of a higher scale (regional and national) in which the focal system is related to higher and lower scales, changing its capability of adaptability and the system learning. In the complex of biologic-cultural, it was also noticed the following diversities: biological, cultural, agricultural and landscape which figure the wealth in socio-biodiversity of this region. The using system of the land is characterized by a long historical persistence and strong connection with the social and environmental system that it can produce. The productive processes and the local knowledge which leaded to the building of the landscape are responsible for the maintenance of local environmental diversity. The complex structure of the mosaic of the landscapes in these areas is an exemplar illustration of biocultural diversity. The resilience evaluation pointed out biocultural indicators in which the system kept itself resilient in the maintenance of biocultural diversity even after the occurred modifications caused by the urbanization, but, this resilience did not lead to sustainability of the agroecosystems with losing risk of local knowledge which were not transmitted across generations. For the sustainability it is necessary an adaptative management which includes the rational using of common goods and knowlege in order to create public policies towards local needs. / O Estado do Tocantins possui a totalidade do território inserido na Amazônia Legal, sendo o baixo curso da Bacia do Ribeirão Taquaruçu Grande em Palmas, uma região de agroecossistemas de produção familiar com diversidade biocultural. Todavia, esses agroecossistemas sofreram grandes transformações ocasionadas pela criação de Palmas, que desencadearam reorganização e adaptabilidade nos sistemas. O objetivo geral do presente estudo foi analisar as transformações bioculturais desses agroecossistemas que propiciam a manutenção da diversidade biocultural e a resiliência para a sustentabilidade. Baseou-se numa integração de métodos qualitativos e quantitativos, com arcabouço teórico metodológico da dialética da complexidade sistêmica, resiliência de sistemas socioecológicos, etnoecologia e transdisciplinaridade. Os resultados indicaram os fatores desencadeantes de mudanças ao longo da trajetória da área estudada e os impactos de fatores externos de uma escala maior (regional e nacional) com a qual o sistema focal se relaciona em escalas maiores e menores, alterando sua capacidade adaptativa e a aprendizagem dos sistemas. Foi identificado no complexo biológico-cultural as diversidades: biológica, cultural, agrícola e paisagística que configura a riqueza em sociobiodiversidade dessa região. O sistema de uso da terra é caracterizado por uma longa persistência histórica e uma forte conexão com os sistemas sociais e ambientais que o produzem. Os processos produtivos e os saberes locais que levaram à construção das paisagens são responsáveis pela manutenção da diversidade dos ambientes locais. A estrutura complexa do mosaico de paisagem nessas áreas é uma ilustração exemplar da diversidade biocultural. A avaliação de resiliência apontou indicadores bioculturais nos quais o sistema se manteve resiliente na manutenção da diversidade biocultural apesar das transformações ocorridas após a urbanização, todavia, essa resiliência não levou à sustentabilidade dos agroecossistemas com risco de perda de saberes locais não transmitidos intergeracionalmente. Para a sustentabilidade é necessária uma gestão adaptativa que inclua o uso racional dos bens comuns e os saberes para a criação de políticas públicas voltadas para as necessidades locais.

The Social Life of Placebos is an interdisciplinary study of the evolution of placebogenic responses – beneficial ones activated by psychosocial triggers -- and their elicitation in Asante medical contexts. Based on an extensive literature review in social, cultural, and medical studies and over 26 months of intensive research in rural Ghana, West Africa, it examines the therapeutic efficacy of Asante medical encounters by analyzing rites of care-giving within an evolutionary framework. Section 1 investigates why evolutionary processes appear to have made human physiology susceptible to psychosocial manipulation, what the health consequences of that susceptibility are in modern environments, and how culturally specific expectations and healing rituals might dampen or amplify that susceptibility. Because of key transitions in human evolution, the fitness consequences of sociality have increased rapidly and created the conditions whereby endogenous mechanisms have become responsive to sociocultural conditions. This explanation helps us better understand why culturally specific rituals can elicit powerful beneficial (placebo) and adverse (nocebo) physiological responses. Using a mixed methodology of physiological data and ethnographic case studies collected from hundreds of Asante medical encounters, Section 2 illuminates evolutionary and proximate processes in Asante contexts of care-giving and healing rituals in detailed chapters on pain, emotion, and stress. It examines the social and cultural resources and techniques that Asante health practitioners rely on for pain management in contexts where no pain medication is available. It analyzes the biocultural interactions that can take place when healers modify patient perceptions, emotions, and expectations. The dissertation concludes with biometric evidence that Asante indigenous ritual healing ceremonies actually promote significant entrainment and relaxation effects.

Health disparities, including higher rates of mental or physical illness, are found among members of minority or marginalized groups including people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. However, there is a paucity of research incorporating both experiential components and measures of physical health, particularly among trans men during their transition from female to male. Trans men transition through the use of testosterone therapy (T) and surgical procedures in order to align their internal male gender identities with their physical presentation. This study combines the analysis of qualitative and quantitative data in order to understand trans men's experience of their changing bodies, identify the primary stressors faced during different stages of transition, and measure the biological manifestation of psychosocial stress during transition. Sixty-five trans men who were utilizing testosterone (T), participated in this cross-sectional study of stress experience during transition. The study involved in-depth, in-person interviews and multiple biological measures including: 24-hours of blood pressure monitoring, three consecutive days of salivary sampling for measures of cortisol and testosterone, a blood-spot for measures of C-reactive protein (CRP), and anthropometric measures. The general hypothesis for this study was that men in earlier, more liminal stages of transition would experience more transition and gender-related stress than men later in the process and that this stress would manifest experientially, psychologically, and physiologically. As expected, transition-specific psychosocial stress was associated with physiological measures, and was more pronounced among trans men in the liminal stages of transition. Moreover, comparisons of stress experience during different stages of transition uncovered variation in how trans men perceived and experienced changes in their bodies and social identity. A number of experiential aspects of transition were identified from the qualitative interviews and found to be linked to physiological stress measures including decreased nocturnal decline in blood pressure, increased cortisol levels, and increased C-reactive protein (CRP). In particular, issues related to transitioning identity stress (TIS), challenges linked to "passing" and being "out" as transgender, and specific acute stressors including the use of gender-specific public restrooms were each found to be independently associated with biological measures of stress.

Truly unique and innovative solutions are needed to resolve today's complex and controversial environmental issues (e.g., biodiversity loss, global warming, cultural evolution, etc.). In response to these concerns, a variety of applied science programs have emerged to help people make better decisions about the environment. Each of these programs (e.g., conservation biology, restoration ecology, sustainable forestry, environmental toxicology, and others) produces specialized knowledge that is used to achieve specific social and environmental goals. For example, the peer-reviewed, scientific analyses published in Conservation Biology are most likely concerned with the goal of preserving biological diversity, whereas the equally scientific and respected analyses published in Forest Science are most likely concerned with the goal of sustaining timber yields. Likewise, studies in environmental toxicology investigate risks to human health by environmental pollutants, while stud! ies in ecological restoration serve to maximize the integrity of natural systems. Unfortunately, these diverse forms of knowledge offer multiple and often conflicting ways of thinking about the environment. Public ecology is a response to this dilemma. The primary goal of public ecology is construct common ground between people's diverse beliefs and values for the environment. Toward this end, public ecology is an interdisciplinary and collaborative approach to environmental science and politics. Public ecology integrates perspectives from the social and natural sciences, the humanities, and public understandings of the environment. Public ecology is not only a cross-cultural and comparative form of environmental studies, it is also a citizen science that encourages all concerned stakeholders to participate with research specialists, technical experts, and professional decision-makers in developing creative solutions to persistent environmental problems. / Ph. D.

O Estado do Tocantins possui a totalidade do território inserido na Amazônia Legal, sendo o baixo curso da Bacia do Ribeirão Taquaruçu Grande em Palmas, uma região de agroecossistemas de produção familiar com diversidade biocultural. Todavia, esses agroecossistemas sofreram grandes transformações ocasionadas pela criação de Palmas, que desencadearam reorganização e adaptabilidade nos sistemas. O objetivo geral do presente estudo foi analisar as transformações bioculturais desses agroecossistemas que propiciam a manutenção da diversidade biocultural e a resiliência para a sustentabilidade. Baseou-se numa integração de métodos qualitativos e quantitativos, com arcabouço teórico metodológico da dialética da complexidade sistêmica, resiliência de sistemas socioecológicos, etnoecologia e transdisciplinaridade. Os resultados indicaram os fatores desencadeantes de mudanças ao longo da trajetória da área estudada e os impactos de fatores externos de uma escala maior (regional e nacional) com a qual o sistema focal se relaciona em escalas maiores e menores, alterando sua capacidade adaptativa e a aprendizagem dos sistemas. Foi identificado no complexo biológico-cultural as diversidades: biológica, cultural, agrícola e paisagística que configura a riqueza em sociobiodiversidade dessa região. O sistema de uso da terra é caracterizado por uma longa persistência histórica e uma forte conexão com os sistemas sociais e ambientais que o produzem. Os processos produtivos e os saberes locais que levaram à construção das paisagens são responsáveis pela manutenção da diversidade dos ambientes locais. A estrutura complexa do mosaico de paisagem nessas áreas é uma ilustração exemplar da diversidade biocultural. A avaliação de resiliência apontou indicadores bioculturais nos quais o sistema se manteve resiliente na manutenção da diversidade biocultural apesar das transformações ocorridas após a urbanização, todavia, essa resiliência não levou à sustentabilidade dos agroecossistemas com risco de perda de saberes locais não transmitidos intergeracionalmente. Para a sustentabilidade é necessária uma gestão adaptativa que inclua o uso racional dos bens comuns e os saberes para a criação de políticas públicas voltadas para as necessidades locais. / The Tocantins State has the totality of its territory inserted into the Brazilian Legal Amazon and it has in it the small stream of Taquaruçu Grande Basin in the city of Palmas, a region of agroecosystems of familiar production and biocultural diversity. However, these agroecosystems suffered such important modifications with the creation of Palmas that caused reorganization and systems adaptability. The main goal of this study was to analyse the biocultural modifications of these agroecosystems which provide the maintenance of the biocultural diversity and the resilience for the sustainability. This study was based on an integration of qualitative and quantitative with the theoretical methodology of dialectics of systemic complexity, resilience of socioecological systems, ethnoecology and transdisciplinarity. The data collected indicated the triggering events of the changes over the trajectory of the studied area and the impacts of external factors of a higher scale (regional and national) in which the focal system is related to higher and lower scales, changing its capability of adaptability and the system learning. In the complex of biologic-cultural, it was also noticed the following diversities: biological, cultural, agricultural and landscape which figure the wealth in socio-biodiversity of this region. The using system of the land is characterized by a long historical persistence and strong connection with the social and environmental system that it can produce. The productive processes and the local knowledge which leaded to the building of the landscape are responsible for the maintenance of local environmental diversity. The complex structure of the mosaic of the landscapes in these areas is an exemplar illustration of biocultural diversity. The resilience evaluation pointed out biocultural indicators in which the system kept itself resilient in the maintenance of biocultural diversity even after the occurred modifications caused by the urbanization, but, this resilience did not lead to sustainability of the agroecosystems with losing risk of local knowledge which were not transmitted across generations. For the sustainability it is necessary an adaptative management which includes the rational using of common goods and knowlege in order to create public policies towards local needs.

The goal of this dissertation is to discuss relationships between the sociocultural environment and nutritional status outcomes in an urban industrialized city with high rates of poverty. The purpose is to highlight the complex web of factors shaping nutritional status outcomes and move beyond cause and effect approaches to nutrition in an environment where obesity is a central nutritional concern. To accomplish this goal, I examine a range of factors that relate to adolescent nutritional practices and nutritional status outcomes in a sample population of adolescents living in Belfast, Northern Ireland. I discuss connections between social locations such as age, gender, geographic area, and socioeconomic status. I also highlight the range of nutritional status outcomes observed in the sample population, while examining broader social, political, and economic aspects of the lives of adolescents that differentially shape nutrition-related experiences in the city. Finally, I demonstrate that adolescents occupy a complex social location in which autonomy, advice, and influence from sociocultural and political-economic factors shape their diet and exercise practices and nutritional status outcomes in multi-faceted, and at times unexpected, ways. In doing so, I emphasize the benefits of a localized, rather than a globalized approach to nutritional concerns such as obesity.

A multidisciplinary research methodology based on the combination of literature review and spatial analysis is presented as a contribution to the historical ecology of olive trees in Sicily (Italy). The thesis crosscuts time and space at different scales for a new epistemological approach to allow the olive trees to “talk”. Structured around the identification of breaking points and nodes of connection, the social and ecological history of the olive trees in the island are explored. While recognising the full agency of trees in the spatial and temporal evolving dynamics of the landscape, the vital importance of their inner connections with other elements of the ecosystems is stressed in the analysis; as also the importance of Traditional Ecological Knowledge. The thesis is concluded with the hypothesis that the olive trees of Sicily could be seen as biocultural refugia, physical places which preserve both agricultural biodiversity and traditional ecological knowledge.

Economic growth has spurred rapid urbanization in Malaysia and triggered changes in diet, lifestyle, and disease trends. National studies show that a third of Malaysia's population is overweight/obese while household expenditures on dining out grow. In metropolitan Kuala Lumpur (KL), residents navigate concepts of nutrition, body weight, and health as they dine out. Using the biocultural framework, this study examined links between body weight, diet, income, street food consumption, and nutritional knowledge through the perspectives of consumers and vendors. Altogether, 77 participants were recruited for this three-phase research. In the first phase, a survey was administered to 60 participants recruited at street food sites around KL. In the second phase, semi-structured interviews, anthropometry, and diet recalls were conducted on 13 participants. Finally, semi-structured interviews and observations were carried out on four street food vendors at their places of business. Though the findings in this research did not show statistical relationships between body weight status, income, and dining out in KL, telling diet and lifestyle trends emerged. Work mediates the lives of participants, often dictating their diet and capacity to engage in physical activity. Though most female participants work, they still bear the expectations of meal provisioning. These factors encourage the consumption of food away from home, and the commercialization and gentrification of the local street food industry. When viewed critically through the biocultural framework, these observations support the idea that trade liberalization and domestic economic policies have induced demographic changes, household transformations, and dietary adaptations among urban dwellers in KL.

Female genital cutting/circumcision/mutilation (FGC) is found predominantly in the Sahel, Northern Africa, removing parts/all of the clitoris, labia minora and majora in girls. Cutting the highly innervated external genitalia may change sensory processing leading to chronic pain. Fourteen Somali women in the Greater Toronto Area (21-46, Type III FGC) completed qualitative, quantitative and psychophysical methods to evaluate pain. Interviews analyzed by interpretive phenomenology form the core method, examining circumcision stories and present, embodied life. The second Short Form McGill Pain Questionnaire and quantitative sensory testing with a vulvalgesiometer form secondary components. Somali women with FGC have pain-filled stories about circumcision and daily life. Socio-cultural considerations are central for women to comprehend how their own bodies feel. SF-MPQ-2 indicates low intensity or no pain symptoms; however, many body regions were indicated. QST reveals low vulvar pressure-pain thresholds. Reports from three measures suggest that FGC may cause sensory changes including chronic pain.

Female genital cutting/circumcision/mutilation (FGC) is found predominantly in the Sahel, Northern Africa, removing parts/all of the clitoris, labia minora and majora in girls. Cutting the highly innervated external genitalia may change sensory processing leading to chronic pain. Fourteen Somali women in the Greater Toronto Area (21-46, Type III FGC) completed qualitative, quantitative and psychophysical methods to evaluate pain. Interviews analyzed by interpretive phenomenology form the core method, examining circumcision stories and present, embodied life. The second Short Form McGill Pain Questionnaire and quantitative sensory testing with a vulvalgesiometer form secondary components. Somali women with FGC have pain-filled stories about circumcision and daily life. Socio-cultural considerations are central for women to comprehend how their own bodies feel. SF-MPQ-2 indicates low intensity or no pain symptoms; however, many body regions were indicated. QST reveals low vulvar pressure-pain thresholds. Reports from three measures suggest that FGC may cause sensory changes including chronic pain.