Thesis advisor: Jonathan Krones / The manifold effects of the COVID-19 pandemic include many changes to humanity's impact on the natural environment, including reduced greenhouse gas emissions from air travel and increased personal protective equipment (PPE) waste generation. The pandemic has served as a global natural experiment, revealing interactions between human health and the environment that were not clearly observable before. This research aims to develop a framework for systematically assessing the impacts of human health on the environment. This framework has been structured and populated from a review of the emerging literature on the documented environmental effects of the pandemic in addition to existing literature on environmental impacts of the health care sector in general. The framework tool catalogs observed and expected environmental effects in five stages of a public health crisis (the health issue, the medical response, the public health response, adaptation and rebound, and long-term effects) and five environmental impact categories (water pollution, solid waste, air pollution, global warming, and environmental degradation). The applicability of this framework is examined using two case studies: the 2003 SARS outbreak and the localized experience of COVID-19 in New York City. The application revealed that the framework is both transferable and scalable for use in assessing other human health crises. Overall, many of the beneficial environmental impacts that occurred as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic only came at the expense of widespread human suffering, and over time, many of these benefits were reversed. The goal is that this tool will be useful to understanding both the ways COVID-19 will continue to affect the environment as well as the effects of potential public health campaigns and crises in the future. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2021. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Departmental Honors. / Discipline: Environmental Studies.

Two impulsivity-related traits, negative and positive urgency (i.e., the tendency to act rashly in the face of extreme negative and positive emotions, respectively) are important risk factors for alcohol use escalation during college and for problematic and disordered level alcohol use, in part through increasing motives for alcohol use. The majority of research to date has focused on the causal direction from trait to motives to alcohol consumption. The goal of the current study was to conduct an initial test of how continued and escalating alcohol use may drive increases and shifts in positive and negative urgency, and how such changes drive subsequent increased drinking motives over the first year of college. Data were analyzed using an archival dataset of 418 first-year college students (age 18-21) enrolled in an introduction to psychology course at a large Midwestern university. Participants were sampled at three timepoints: at the beginning of the fall semester, the end of the fall semester, and the end of the spring semester. A series of hierarchical multiple regression and mediation analyses were used to test study hypotheses. Changes in alcohol use did not predict later changes in positive and negative urgency. Results did replicate previous research showing that changes in positive and negative urgency predicted later changes in drinking motives. Finally, there was some evidence that alcohol use at baseline predicted changes in enhancement drinking motives through changes in positive urgency; but this pattern was not seen with negative urgency. This work extends existing work with urgency theory, which has primarily focused on the effects of urgency on subsequent alcohol consumption and not the inverse. The fact that alcohol use drives subsequent changes in positive urgency and drinking motives can help to better identify mechanisms contributing increased risk for transition to problematic levels of alcohol consumption, can lead to better identification of those at risk for problematic alcohol use and can set the stage to better integrate urgency theory with other well-established alcohol risk models.

Numerous researchers have shown that community gardens have the potential to eliminate social, communal, health, agricultural and economic problems that many in the United States and the rest of the world are facing. Yet, throughout history allotment and community gardens have been seen as improper elements of urban landscapes and used predominately for crisis mitigation and not as sustainable solutions. This thesis shows that the current U.S. community garden movement is inherently different than past unsustainable movements and may establish community gardens as sustainable features of many municipalities in the U.S. This is because the modern U.S. movement is supported by more research and infrastructure than in the past; it is composed of many more social and financial groups; it is sponsored by multiple groups (private, public and non-profit); it incorporates multiple uses; and it was spurred by many unconnected catalysts rather than by a single major crisis. The histories of, and connections between, past movements in the U.S. and the U.K. are validated by extensive documentation and records. Additionally, surveys and interviews were conducted with community gardens in Kansas, New York and Texas and the results of these surveys and interviews indicate the current movement is indeed strong, diverse and expanding.

Migratory bird communities are sensitive to landscape alteration. Urban development significantly impacts bird communities on breeding grounds, as well as en-route during migration. One current theory is that Neotropical migratory birds are not limited by breeding or wintering habitat constraints but by food and habitat availability along major migration routes. The eastern flyway is the route taken by neotropical land-birds through eastern North America that follows coastal areas denoted by intense urban development. Coastal areas funnel birds to major departure points along the northern coast of the Gulf of Mexico and the western coast of Florida. Birds were monitored for 12 consecutive months along a decadal time gradient of urban development. Cypress domes are present through a broad scale of urban development in Hillsborough County creating ideal natural sampling units for long term monitoring of wetland bird communities in urban areas. Residential non-migratory bird communities were least influenced by development and did not change significantly with urban development. Neotropical and short-distance migratory birds, however, declined significantly for both richness and bird abundance with increased urban land cover. Migratory birds positively correlated with forested area at a spatial scale of 500 meters surrounding sites. Wintering migrants hit a critical point in development between 10 and 20 years of age, after which they disappeared. Neotropical migrants were most sensitive to declines significantly at sites classified as heavily degraded by the UMAM (Uniform Mitigation Assessment Method) a 'wetland integrity index'.

There is a strong concern about the environmental and social impacts ­­­of land use changes caused by sugarcane expansion. This research aims to assess the land use changes caused by sugarcane expansion in the State of São Paulo in the last five years, as well as predicting land use changes in the coming years. In addition, this research evaluates the social impacts of sugarcane expansion. The assessment of land use changes was made through GIS analysis. First, the changes during the last five years were evaluated. Based on this information, the land use changes for the coming years were estimated. The social impacts of sugarcane expansion were evaluated by studying the correlation between Human Development Index (HDI) and the sugarcane expansion. The results confirm that sugarcane crop expanded about 1.85 million hectares between 2003 and 2008. About 62% of this expansion replaced areas used for agricultural crop in 2003, and about 34% replaced areas used for pasture in 2003. Three scenarios were created in order to estimate sugarcane expansion in the coming years. In the first scenario, sugarcane would expand about 0.9 million hectares in three years; in the second scenario, 1.1 million hectares in four years; and in the third scenario, 1.4 million hectares in six years. In each scenario, about 70% of the expansion would take place in areas used for agricultural crops in 2003, and 40% in areas used for pasture in 2003. The sugarcane expansion caused a significant and positive impact on the income dimension of HDI for regions with a very low level of development. For regions of medium and high level of development, the HDI impact was not significant. In addition, a slightly negative impact on the longevity dimension of HDI was observed.

The primary goal of this dissertation is to determine the relationship between the effects of tourism and stakeholders' quality of life. Specifically, the research investigates stakeholders' perception of the impact of tourism on their life domains, their satisfaction with life domains, and their overall life satisfaction. The relationships among these three components are examined. Depending on the types of stakeholders, their perceptions of and attitudes toward the impact of tourism and quality of life might be different. Therefore, the moderating effect of stakeholders' perceptions of the impact of tourism in life domains and satisfaction with life domains is investigated. Accordingly, the study proposes three research questions: (1) Does the perception of tourism impact in life domains affect satisfaction with different life domains? (2) Does satisfaction with life domains affect overall QOL? (3) Does the perspective of different stakeholders have a moderating effect on the relationship between the perception of tourism impacts in life domains and satisfaction with life domains? The sample population of stakeholders residing in Hawaii, Virginia, Orlando (FL), Las Vegas (NV), and New York City (NY) was surveyed. Four hundred seven usable questionnaires were subjected to data analysis. Structural equation modeling (SEM) and hierarchical multiple regression (HMR) were performed to test the hypotheses.     The results revealed that the stakeholders' perception of the impact of tourism in the material life domain did affect their material life domain satisfaction. This study also indicated that their satisfaction with the material and non-material life domains significantly influenced their overall quality of life. The hypothesized moderating effects of the perspective of different stakeholders on the relationship between the perception of the impact of tourism in material/non-material life domain and the material/non-material life satisfaction were supported. / Ph. D.

With rising valuation of mineral commodities, mining has been envisioned as a profitable industry regardless of many challenges it entails. This comprehensive review provides the state of knowledge about several aspects of the metal mining industry, including (a) the basic mining processes with reasons for mine closure, (b) the potential environmental and human health impacts associated with mining, (c) the potential techniques for impact mitigation, (d) the latest production statistics for the base and precious metals with identification of currently operational major metal mines for different countries, and (e) how mining activities are regulated in different nations. Finally, the authors provide critical appraisal on the debatable issue of mining and sustainability to stimulate thoughts on how metal mining can be made sustainable, and suggest a path forward.

With rising valuation of mineral commodities, mining has been envisioned as a profitable industry regardless of many challenges it entails. This comprehensive review provides the state of knowledge about several aspects of the metal mining industry, including (a) the basic mining processes with reasons for mine closure, (b) the potential environmental and human health impacts associated with mining, (c) the potential techniques for impact mitigation, (d) the latest production statistics for the base and precious metals with identification of currently operational major metal mines for different countries, and (e) how mining activities are regulated in different nations. Finally, the authors provide critical appraisal on the debatable issue of mining and sustainability to stimulate thoughts on how metal mining can be made sustainable, and suggest a path forward.

The development of oil shale resources will have a significant impact on the Uintah Basin in Utah. To analyze this impact, this study used a regionalized imput-output model. The input-output table for the State of Utah was revised to fit the Uintah Basin, using the RAS technique. The scarcity of water in the Basin may cause a shift of water use from irrigated agriculture to oil shale. This reduction in agricultural production was estimated, using demand curves for water in agriculture and an intergen programming model which generated minimum water requirements for shale developments from 25,000 barrels per day to 250,000 barrels per day. The inclusion of agricultural decline and of the shale industry's rows and columns, based on previous studies, allowed the estimation of a type IV multiplier. The input-output table was closed, and regional gross output estimated for the various levels of shale production. Results indicate very large changes in retail and wholesale trade, real estate and housing, and public service sectors for high levels of shale production. The loss in agricultural production appears to have almost insignificant effects in comparison. Local planners may be faced with providing significant increases in services, and a large expansion of the private sectors if shale development is substantial.

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