Environmental Change Since the Woodland Period in the Mid-Ohio Valley: Results from Patton Bog Sediment Core Palynological Analyses

Palynological analyses of sediment cores from Patton Bog in southeastern Ohio recorded environmental changes from ca. 1000 B.C. to the present, representing the first pollen core analyzed from this region. Pollen data show an increase in prairie species, implying periodic expansion of grassland environments during the Woodland period coeval with the initial collection and eventual domestication of Eastern Agricultural Complex seeds. It is suggested that these environmental changes influenced human decisions concerning plant domestication and diet in the mid-Ohio Valley.     

Applying Geostatistical Analysis to Crime Data: Car-Related Thefts in the Baltic States

Geostatistical methods have rarely been applied to area-level offense data. This article demonstrates their potential for improving the interpretation and understanding of crime patterns using previously analyzed data about car-related thefts for Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in 2000. The variogram is used to inform about the scales of variation in offense, social, and economic data. Area-to-area and area-to-point Poisson kriging are used to filter the noise caused by the small number problem. The latter is also used to produce continuous maps of the estimated crime risk (expected number of crimes per 10,000 habitants), thereby reducing the visual bias of large spatial units. In seeking to detect the most likely crime clusters, the uncertainty attached to crime risk estimates is handled through a local cluster analysis using stochastic simulation. Factorial kriging analysis is used to estimate the local- and regional-scale spatial components of the crime risk and explanatory variables. Then regression modeling is used to determine which factors are associated with the risk of car-related theft at different scales.     

Gender,Environment and Population

Based on field research from three regions with distinct variations in environment, population density, livelihood bases and levels of resource dependency, this study investigates the gender aspects of environmental change. It seeks to illustrate the relevance of gender factors for the patterns of adaptation to change, for the welfare impact of changes on the population, and for the ramifications for resource management and livelihood generation at the community level. It employs a gender analysis to examine the impact of such changes on population variables, particularly on health and nutrition, and to explore the more general question of whether women's socio-economic status is being threatened by the pressures of environmental change.