What is Human Dimensions Research?

1. participation education research outreach period of low human impact period of high human impact cone of possibilities Development Summer sea ice extent Time Human Dimensions Research - Data, Integration, and Synthesis Maribeth S. Murray, Dept. of Anthropology & HARC Core Office, Center for Global Change, University of Alaska Fairbanks • Emerging Trends in HD Interdisciplinary Research • Focus on downscale interactions and feedbacks. • Describing and analyzing the role of institutions in causing and mitigating arctic/global environmental problems and the role of arctic residents in national and international arctic/global change policy development. • Study of fatality rates and links to arctic/global change including changes in disease types, invasive infectious diseases, parasites etc. • Identifying and explaining the links among arctic change, industrial development contaminant pathways, exposure rates, and human security. • Emerging/existing vulnerabilities in food-system security in the context of Arctic change (farming, agriculture, subsistence, industrial). • Comparative global-scale analysis of the dimensions of climate change impacts. What is Human Dimensions Research? A clear design for investigation of the interactions and feedbacks among the human and the biophysical components of the Arctic System. Interdisciplinary - linking social and biophysical sciences. Situated in the context of global/arctic environmental change. • Human Dimensions Research is NOT • Outreach and Communication • Education • Community Participation • BUT these things can and should be incorporated into HD and system research initiatives. In fall 2006, researchers, students, tribal representatives and other stakeholders gathered at the AAAS Arctic division annual meeting and in the Alaskan community of Fort Yukon to compare data on climate change impacts and feedbacks in rural Alaskan to those in rural Sudan, Kenya and Nigeria. Pictured in top photo are: Pail Williams, Fort Yukon Alaska, Mey Eltayeb Ahmed, Conflict Transformation and Environmental Changes, University of Khartoum, Sudan, Chinwe Ifejika Speranza, Centre for Development and Environment, Institute of Geography, University of Berne, Switzerland, Marie Rarieya, Dept of Science and Technology Studies, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Phillip Loring, Anthropology University of Alaska Fairbanks, Henry Huntington, Huntington Consulting, Eagle River Alaska. In the bottom photo are Marie Rarieya, Ben Stevens Council of Athabascan Tribal Groups, Fort Yukon Alaska, and May Eltayeh. Photos courtesy of Craig Fleener, CATG, Fort Yukon Alaska. http://arctic.aaas.org/ Human Dimensions Data – What Is It? • Highest Priority Key Unknowns • Ways in which different human activities in the Arctic impact and feedback to the biophysical components of the Arctic System. • Ways in which people in the Arctic respond to changes in Arctic System components. • Ways in which Arctic System change impacts and feeds back to the human component of the global system. • Ways in which different human activities outside the Arctic impact and feed back to the Arctic system. Multiple Temporal Scales Daily Seasonal Annual Decadal Multi-decadal Century Millennial • Key Research Questions • How has and how does human agency modify the present and future state of the Arctic System?(Impacts and Feedbacks) • How have and how will Arctic peoples and institutions adapt to variable environmental conditions, to fluctuating resources, and to changes in the political and economic milieu?(Adaptations) • How do changes in the Arctic System relate to and impact the broader Global System? (Teleconnections) • In the face of multi-dimensional global changes, how will the resilience of the Arctic system change and what policies and practices will lead to greater resilience within the pan-arctic and its subregions?(Resilience) “Time indexed framework of quantitative data provides a way to organize and reference qualitative accounts” (HARC SSC 2005). In system analysis the structure of the variables gives rise to the behavior of the system (Allison and Hobbs 2004). Understanding impacts on and feedbacks from the human dimension requires the integrated use of qualitative and quantitative datasets. For example analyses of linkages among the climate, marine, and human components might include variables such as 1) area of productive fishing, 2) number of commercial fishing vessels, 3) age of fisherman, 4) market price for fish, 5) quota limits, 6) local systems of sea tenure (access to marine resources based on heredity or other locally defined rules), 7) weather conditions at multiple spatial and temporal scales, 8) measures of primary productivity, and 9)changes in ocean temperature (for a similar example see Hamilton et al. 2000). Figure 5. From Huntington et al., 2007. Development vs. time along with summer sea ice extent. The vertical dashed line marks a transition from low potential human impact to high potential human impact as sea ice decrease makes access easier to the Arctic for example through the reliable opening of the Northern Sea Route without icebreaker support. • Primary Goals of HD Research in the Context of ARCSS • Data collection at multiple spatial scales. • Time series HD data (multiple time scales). • Standardization of methods and datasets. • Construction of multivariate time plots to integrate qualitative and quantitative data across disciplines. • Socio-ecological hotspot mapping. • Integrated modeling to develop understanding of the behavior(s) of the human component of the system and to explore the implications of behavioral change on a system-wide scale. http://www.alaskaseafood.org/flavor/aksalm2.htm References Cited. Allison, D. E. and R. J. Hobbs, 2004. Resilience, adaptive capacity, and the “Lock-in-trap” of the Western Australian Agricultural Region. Ecology and Society 9(1): 3 [online] URL: http://www.ecologyandsociet.org/vol9/iss1/art3. Hamilton, L.C., P. Lyster, and O. Otterstad, 2000. Social change, ecology, and climate in 20th century Greenland. Climatic Change 47(1/2): 193-211.HARC Science Steering Committee, 2005. Designing the Human Dimension into an Arctic Observing Network. Arctic Research Consortium of the United States, Fairbanks. Huntington, H.P., M. Boyle, G. E. Flowers, J.W. Weatherly, L.C. Hamilton, L. Hinzman, C. Gerlach, R. Zeluta, C. Nicolson, and J. Overpeck, 2007. The influence of human activity in the Arctic on climate and climate impacts. Climatic Change, online publication first, 3/16/07.