anonymous online comments and gatekeeping in the digital realm

"December 2013.""A thesis presented to the faculty of the graduate school at the University of Missouri--Columbia in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree, master of arts."Thesis supervisor: Ryan J. Thomas.This research examines the trend of anonymous online speech and the evolution of traditional gatekeeping roles of journalists as new media interaction with the public becomes commonplace. A textual analysis explores the opinions held by journalists and commenters (to online news sites) on the topic of online comments boards, trolling and the role anonymity places in public discourse on the Internet. The issue of civility among posters to anonymous online comment boards must be studied if journalists hope to navigate the relationship with these participatory news consumers going forward. In order to benefit from the opportunities for interactivity that new media provide, the industry must work to understand the phenomenon of trolling and devise a way to promote productive conversation that protects the marketplace of ideas while maintaining civility.Includes bibliographical references (pages 80-87)

Lactose Intolerance: An Overview of the Facts and Their Implications

Lactose intolerance is often blamed for the symptoms such as bloating, diarrhea, gas, abdominal pain, and nausea, that ail many people. Patients often do not seek proper diagnosis from a physician and create their own treatment plans, severely restricting lactose intake, without professional guidance. Even those who do seek the care of a physician find that diagnosis is complicated by less-than ideal testing and confusion due to the symptoms common to many other conditions. The misconceptions and inability to confirm a diagnosis of lactose intolerance can cause nutrient deficiencies in these patients, as well as begin a pattern of unnecessary lactose elimination that can continue for generations. The truth is that lactose restriction does help ease these symptoms regardless of their true cause, but complete elimination is not necessary in most cases. Each individual is unique and must experiment with their own tolerance to determine the level of lactose their body can digest. This paper aims to help those who might suffer from lactose intolerance understand the condition and maintain a healthy diet and lifestyle

Resilience Thinking and Structured Decision Making in Social-Ecological Systems

Natural resource management may be improved by synthesizing approaches for framing and addressing complex social-ecological issues. This dissertation examines how structured decision making processes, including adaptive management, can incorporate resilience thinking. Structured decision making is a process for establishing a solid understanding of the problem, values, management options, and potential consequences. Adaptive management is a form of structured decision making in which uncertainty is reduced for iterative decisions through designed monitoring and review. Resilience thinking can help conceptualize complex social-ecological systems and draws attention to the risks of managing for narrowly-focused objectives. This dissertation provides practical advice to managers and can facilitate discussions regarding how to make wise decisions in complex social-ecological systems. Specifically, I explore how an iterative structured decision making process can contribute to the resilience of an oak forest in southeastern Nebraska. Chapter 2 discusses how a structured decision making process can emphasize principles of resilience thinking. I present a suite of management recommendations, drawing on information from practitioners’ guides and using oak forest conservation as a case study. Chapter 3 demonstrates how oak forest models can reflect elements of resilience thinking and be used to identify optimal policies. I quantify a state-and-transition model into a Markov decision process by establishing transition probabilities based on resilience assumptions and setting the time horizon (infinite), discount factor, and reward function. Limitations are discussed, including that the optimal policy is sensitive to uncertainty about aspects of the Markov decision process. Chapter 4 provides a practical method for incorporating adaptive management projects into State Wildlife Action Plans, in part based on experience with conservation planning in Nebraska. I present a dichotomous key for identifying when to use adaptive management and a basic introduction to developing adaptive management projects are presented. Chapter 5 describes an initial effort to reduce uncertainty for oak forest conservation in southeastern Nebraska. I use multimodel inference to explore different hypotheses about what environmental and management variables are correlated with oak seedling abundance. The results indicate that the number of large oaks is an important factor. I discuss adaptive management as a potential means for further investigating management effects. Chapter 6 synthesizes the dissertation by considering the management implications for oak forest conservation in southeastern Nebraska, identifying general challenges and limitations, presenting methods for improving the framework, and returning to the broader goal of implementing the social-ecological systems paradigm. Adviser: Craig R. Alle

The PARTNER Model: An Attachment-Based Practice Model for Providers Working with Mothers and Infants Impacted by Perinatal Opioid Use Disorders

There are an estimated 2.5 million people in the United States of America suffering from opioid use disorders. Of the 2.5 million Americans impacted by opioid use disorders, over half are women. One of the most challenging aspects of opioid use disorders occurs in the context of pregnancy. Discourse surrounding the topic of addiction often identifies the root cause of addiction as a moral failing, rather than a pathophysiological disease. This stigma is amplified in the context of pregnancy and perpetuates the false, discriminatory notion that pregnant women with opioid use disorders are knowingly “harming” their babies without regard. Instead of receiving support, education, and encouragement, pregnant women with opioid use disorders are faced with stigma, judgment, shame, and guilt. These negative interactions ultimately serve as barriers that interfere with the ability for early attachment bond development, a monumentally important piece of newborn development and the most significant contributor to healthy attachment development. These avoidable, institutionally created barriers propagate both short- and long-term risk factors for the mother and infant, both independently and as a dyad. This dissertation will systematically explore several aspects of perinatal opioid use disorders to develop an evidence-informed practice model for healthcare providers working with pregnant and postpartum women with opioid use disorders. This dissertation will also explore the intersection of perinatal opioid use disorders and attachment theory, which will serve as the framework for the PARTNER model, an attachment-based practice model for providers working with mothers and infants impacted by perinatal opioid use disorders. Composite case vignettes, informed by clinical experience and empirical literature, are integrated throughout this dissertation to illuminate and connect the critical concepts that set the foundation for the PARTNER model

Measuring Welfare Loss Caused by Air Pollution in Europe: A CGE Analysis

Abstract and PDF report are also available on the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change website (http://globalchange.mit.edu/).To evaluate the socio-economic impacts of air pollution, we develop an integrated approach based on computable general equilibrium (CGE). Applying our approach to Europe shows that even there, where air quality is relatively high compared with other parts of the world, health-related damages caused by air pollution are substantial. We estimate that in 2005, air pollution in Europe caused a consumption loss of around 220 billion Euro (year 2000 prices, around 3 percent of consumption level) and a social welfare loss of around 370 billion Euro, measured as the sum of lost consumption and leisure (around 2 percent of welfare level). In addition, we estimated that a set of 2020-targeting air quality improvement policy scenarios, which are proposed in the 2005 CAFE program, would bring 18 European countries as a whole a welfare gain of 37 to 49 billion Euro (year 2000 prices) in year 2020 alone.This study received support from the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, which is funded by a consortium of government, industry and foundation sponsors