Characterizing Vegetative Communities Across the Salt Marsh to Upland Ecotone in Connecticut: Indications of Tidal Inundation Stress in the High Marsh

The viability of Connecticut’s future salt marshes remains uncertain as pressure from multiple anthropogenic stressors and accelerated relative sea level rise continue to undermine the dynamic ecogeomorphic mechanisms that allow these landscapes to persist in times of environmental change. Observed rates of relative sea level rise in the Long Island Sound estuary appear to be accelerating since recording began in the early 1930s. Furthermore, as much as 90% of the land parcels expected to undergo habitat change as marine ecosystems migrate landward are privately owned and managed. This finding suggests that, in addition to these intrinsic ecogeomorphic feedbacks that make salt marshes viable, sociopolitical variables will also play a key role in the sustainability of these ecosystems in the future. This thesis characterized vegetative community structuring at the salt marsh to upland boundary at five different sites along the Connecticut Coast. Nearly 40% of the marshes sampled exhibited manifestations of tidal inundation stress including high relative percentages of the low marsh species Spartina alterniflora (stunted) and deposited tidal wrack mats in the high marsh zone. Common reed, bare areas, and turf lawns had the highest average percent cover type of all the cover types identified within the transition zone. Six of the fourteen transects were observed to have these features prevailing near the apparent salt marsh to upland edge. Despite these apparent disturbances, the transects sampled in this thesis were found to have high variability in plant community assemblages both within and between each study site location. Other than observing species richness to increase from west to east across the state, the presence of tidal restricting structures, adjacent upland cover type, and geographic variables were not found to be good predictors of the variation in vegetative assemblages in the marshes studied in this thesis. This finding suggests that local variations, such as topography, competition, and tidal regimes, are prevailing conditions controlling plant community assemblages across the high marsh to upland ecotone

City and Countryside Revisited. Comparative rent movements in London and the South-East, 1580-1914

Economic historians have traditionally argued that urban growth in England was driven primarily by prior improvements in agricultural supply in the two centuries before the industrial revolution. Recent revisionist scholarship by writers such as Jan Luiten van Zanden and Robert Allen has suggested that 'the city drove the countryside, not the reverse'. This paper assembles new serial data on urban and agricultural rent movements in Kent, Essex and London, from 1580-1914, which enables us to provide a tentative estimate of the strength of the urban variable and the productivity of land across the rural-urban continuum. Our initial findings support the revisionist view, and throw new light on London's position within the wider metropolitan region. Comparative rent movements suggests a greater continuity between town and countryside than has often been assumed, with sharp increases in rental values occurring on the rural-urban fringes of London and the lower Medway valley

Time-Dependent Density-Functional Theory for the Stopping Power of an Interacting Electron Gas for Slow Ions

Based on the time-dependent density-functional theory, we have derived a rigorous formula for the stopping power of an {\it interacting} electron gas for ions in the limit of low projectile velocities. If dynamical correlation between electrons is not taken into account, this formula recovers the corresponding stopping power of {\it noninteracting} electrons in an effective Kohn-Sham potential. The correlation effect, specifically the excitonic one in electron-hole pair excitations, however, is found to considerably enhance the stopping power for intermediately charged ions, bringing our theory into good agreement with experiment.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figure, Accepted to Phys. Rev. B (Rapid Communication

To tell my story: an exploration of narrative, emotion and narrative identity processes in counselling psychology treatment sessions

Talking therapies are narratively structured. A person experiencing some kind of distress tells a therapist stories about their past, present and possible futures. The therapist listens, observes and responds, and as they do so, they assist in making sense of the stories told in relation to their own narratives; for instance, a meta-narrative such as attachment theory, previous clinical encounters and their own life experiences. However, the processes involved in narrativisation in therapy have not been subject to as much research as might reasonably be expected for such an integral aspect of the encounter. In an attempt to inform counselling psychology practice and research, this piece of work focused on analysing narratives in therapy sessions to explore how stories told are internal, subjective, authentic expressions of how a client grasps their world; yet equally, how there might be external conditions that limit what the client can access of this world. A secondary focus was to explore how these evolving therapy narratives might relate to the constructs of agency and change. A blended form of narrative analysis, observing meaning-making, emotion, narrative identity and dialogical processes, was applied to the recordings of three consecutive sessions shared by three therapist-client dyads, each at different stages in therapy. The result offers a multi-layered understanding of how internal and external elements affect the meaning-making processes central to the practice of counselling psychology and psychotherapy. Suggestions are made in relation to therapeutic work, regarding the need for a greater awareness of these processes in clients, and of the implications of the meta-narratives of therapy itself

Caretaker Satisfaction With Law Enforcement Response to Missing Children.

Examines satisfaction with law enforcement from the perspective of all primary caretakers who contacted police when one or more of their children experienced a qualifying episode in the Second National Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway, and Thrownaway Children (NISMART–2) National Household Survey of Adult Caretakers. This Bulletin is the eighth in the NISMART–2 series

Wonder Woman 1987–1990: the Goddess, the Iron Maiden and the sacralisation of consumerism

In 1987, Wonder Woman was revised as part of an overhaul of the DC Universe, in the Crisis on Infinite Earths story arc. This paper analyses the representation of Diana in George Pérez, Greg Potter and Len Wein’s revision of the character, February 1987–December 1991. The writers discarded her Diana Prince secret identity and Steve Trevor as love interest. Influenced by spiritual and feminist discourses of the mid-1970s onwards, he made her into a Goddess-like fantasy figure split into two identities. She is Diana, Princess of Themyscira, a private, spiritual neo-pagan, but she is branded in consumer culture as Wonder Woman, goddess. The discourses constructing Wonder Woman as goddess, however, clashed with feminist and societal discourses circulating in popular culture and politics of late 1980s’ America. These discourses aimed at disempowering female autonomy. The clash between these discourses highlighted paradoxes in Wonder Woman as a female icon of empowerment

Reading production and culture UK teen Girl comics from 1955 to 1960

© Berghahn Books In this article I explore the production of teen girl comics such as Marilyn, Mirabelle, Roxy and Valentine in the promotion of pop music and pop stars from 1955 to 1960. These comics developed alongside early pop music and consisted of serial and self-contained picture stories, beauty and pop music articles, advice columns, and horoscopes. Materiality is a key component of the importance of comics in the promotional culture in a media landscape in which pop music was difficult to access for teenage girls. I analyze the comics within their historical and cultural framework and show how early British pop stars were constructed through paradoxical discourses such as religion, consumerism, and national identity to make them safe for teen girl consumption. The promotion of these star images formed the foundation for later pop music promotion and girl fan practices