Student Conference on Conservation Science: New York 2025
Student Conference on Conservation Science: New York
Center for Biodiversity and Conservation at the American Museum of Natural History
Oct 15-17, 2025
A multi-scalar behavioral framework for conservation planning: Illustrating applications for Allegheny woodrat reintroduction in the Shawangunk Ridge, New York
Accepted Abstract
Reintroduction programs are widely used in conservation but frequently fail to establish self-sustaining populations. A growing body of research suggests that insufficient integration of animal behavior into planning contributes to these outcomes. Although the field of conservation behavior (Berger-Tal et al., 2011) highlights the importance of behavioral processes, there remains limited guidance on how to operationalize these insights in reintroduction planning.
This study develops a conceptual, multi-scalar framework for incorporating animal behavior into conservation decision-making and illustrates its application using the Allegheny woodrat (Neotoma magister) in the Shawangunk Ridge, New York. The framework links key behavioral domains to ecological scales, including movement at the landscape scale, foraging and vigilance at the habitat scale, social organization at the niche scale, and species-specific perceptual processes at the level of the umwelt.
Drawing on published ecological and behavioral literature, this study synthesizes species-specific requirements and identifies potential constraints relevant to reintroduction planning, including habitat connectivity, food resource variability, and predation risk. The case study demonstrates how a behaviorally informed approach can reveal mismatches between traditional habitat-based planning and the behavioral needs of a species. While theoretical in nature, this framework provides a structured approach for integrating behavioral data into conservation planning and offers practical insights for improving the design of reintroduction programs. More broadly, it contributes to ongoing efforts to bridge the gap between animal behavior research and applied conservation practice.
Anthrozoology As International Practice (AIP) Conference 2024
Lions, Orcas & Otters, Oh My! Radical Acts of Animal Resistance Fighters
Accepted Abstract
Whereas, in the academy, debates about animal agency intersect with notions of anthropocentrism and political ideologies of ecologism, there is scant evidence of comparable deliberation in the mainstream public dialogue. Although it might be argued that these kinds of theoretical debates are unimportant for actual praxis, several scholars have put considerable stake in the potential of social media to inform the struggle against the exploitation of nonhuman animals. My intention in this paper is twofold. First is to center our attention on the re-narrativization of animals cropping up in the ‘marketplace of ideas.’ Specifically, I wish to point out that, in the realm of digital communication, animals are being cast into the public moral imagination as heroes and resistance fighters. Second is to contend that this biographical reframing of animals engages with theoretical aspects of critical animal studies that seek to liberate animals from their place as metaphorical placeholders and move them into the gential, the real, the reactionary, provoking us to rethink our relationship with, and our response-ability to, our fellow nonhumans. I begin by placing my argument within the genealogy of academic thought that provides the conditions of possibility for this analysis. After a brief discussion of animal resistance, I present three mini case-studies (Otter 841, orcas, and Tsavo lions) as examples of how this biographical reframing is communicated through memes and headlines. I hope to suggest that these reflect a growing public acknowledgement of humanimal entanglement that, when taken together, form a coherent critique of the dominant world systems as unjust, oppressive, and ecologically unjustifiable.
Asia-Norway Environmental Storytelling (ANEST) Network 2024
Storytelling for Environmental Futures
Accepted Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to contest the notion that voicing animal subjectivity in nonfictional discourse can only ever be a fictional enterprise. By focusing on ‘roadkill’ as both conservation crisis and research case study, this paper makes the point that new stories about identity (human and nonhuman) are needed to promote change in the face of overwhelming environmental challenges.
Design/Methodology/Approach – The argument in this paper draws on findings from ethology, psychology, and conservation that attest to animals’ behavior, cognitive ability, and sapience, to demonstrate that centering animal subjectivity in research encourages nonanthropocentric narratives of the roadkill problem and concomitant solutions.
Findings – The findings of this paper make a case for the inclusion of “acts of speaking-for that cross the species boundary” (Herman, 2016), and suggest that embedding this type of narrative technique into research relating to ‘roadkill’ has the potential to generate (epistemological) insights about alternative validities that can promote affirmative discourse (Macgilchrist, 2021).
Practical implications – If we accept that the human-centered stories we tell are largely responsible for the environmental crisis the planet faces today, then giving voice to the subjectivity of animals might yield new ways of worlding that better equip the planet to face environmental challenges now and in the future. Although rarely considered legitimate in academic discourse, by fostering empathy for nonhuman ways of being in the world, narrating stories of nonhuman animals might expand the kinds of decisions humans can make, and, in turn, the kinds of futures these decisions make possible.
As far as ‘roadkill’ is concerned, telling the story of habitually road-killed animals’ lives connects them to people, things and events in a way that stands to garner political support, positive action, and behavioral change.