dissertation topics in rural areas

Research Topics & Ideas: Environment

100+ Environmental Science Research Topics & Ideas

Finding and choosing a strong research topic is the critical first step when it comes to crafting a high-quality dissertation, thesis or research project. Here, we’ll explore a variety research ideas and topic thought-starters related to various environmental science disciplines, including ecology, oceanography, hydrology, geology, soil science, environmental chemistry, environmental economics, and environmental ethics.

NB – This is just the start…

The topic ideation and evaluation process has multiple steps . In this post, we’ll kickstart the process by sharing some research topic ideas within the environmental sciences. This is the starting point though. To develop a well-defined research topic, you’ll need to identify a clear and convincing research gap , along with a well-justified plan of action to fill that gap.

If you’re new to the oftentimes perplexing world of research, or if this is your first time undertaking a formal academic research project, be sure to check out our free dissertation mini-course. Also be sure to also sign up for our free webinar that explores how to develop a high-quality research topic from scratch.

Overview: Environmental Topics

• Ecology /ecological science
• Atmospheric science
• Oceanography
• Soil science
• Environmental chemistry
• Environmental economics
• Environmental ethics
• Examples  of dissertations and theses

Topics & Ideas: Ecological Science

• The impact of land-use change on species diversity and ecosystem functioning in agricultural landscapes
• The role of disturbances such as fire and drought in shaping arid ecosystems
• The impact of climate change on the distribution of migratory marine species
• Investigating the role of mutualistic plant-insect relationships in maintaining ecosystem stability
• The effects of invasive plant species on ecosystem structure and function
• The impact of habitat fragmentation caused by road construction on species diversity and population dynamics in the tropics
• The role of ecosystem services in urban areas and their economic value to a developing nation
• The effectiveness of different grassland restoration techniques in degraded ecosystems
• The impact of land-use change through agriculture and urbanisation on soil microbial communities in a temperate environment
• The role of microbial diversity in ecosystem health and nutrient cycling in an African savannah

Topics & Ideas: Atmospheric Science

• The impact of climate change on atmospheric circulation patterns above tropical rainforests
• The role of atmospheric aerosols in cloud formation and precipitation above cities with high pollution levels
• The impact of agricultural land-use change on global atmospheric composition
• Investigating the role of atmospheric convection in severe weather events in the tropics
• The impact of urbanisation on regional and global atmospheric ozone levels
• The impact of sea surface temperature on atmospheric circulation and tropical cyclones
• The impact of solar flares on the Earth’s atmospheric composition
• The impact of climate change on atmospheric turbulence and air transportation safety
• The impact of stratospheric ozone depletion on atmospheric circulation and climate change
• The role of atmospheric rivers in global water supply and sea-ice formation

Topics & Ideas: Oceanography

• The impact of ocean acidification on kelp forests and biogeochemical cycles
• The role of ocean currents in distributing heat and regulating desert rain
• The impact of carbon monoxide pollution on ocean chemistry and biogeochemical cycles
• Investigating the role of ocean mixing in regulating coastal climates
• The impact of sea level rise on the resource availability of low-income coastal communities
• The impact of ocean warming on the distribution and migration patterns of marine mammals
• The impact of ocean deoxygenation on biogeochemical cycles in the arctic
• The role of ocean-atmosphere interactions in regulating rainfall in arid regions
• The impact of ocean eddies on global ocean circulation and plankton distribution
• The role of ocean-ice interactions in regulating the Earth’s climate and sea level

Tops & Ideas: Hydrology

• The impact of agricultural land-use change on water resources and hydrologic cycles in temperate regions
• The impact of agricultural groundwater availability on irrigation practices in the global south
• The impact of rising sea-surface temperatures on global precipitation patterns and water availability
• Investigating the role of wetlands in regulating water resources for riparian forests
• The impact of tropical ranches on river and stream ecosystems and water quality
• The impact of urbanisation on regional and local hydrologic cycles and water resources for agriculture
• The role of snow cover and mountain hydrology in regulating regional agricultural water resources
• The impact of drought on food security in arid and semi-arid regions
• The role of groundwater recharge in sustaining water resources in arid and semi-arid environments
• The impact of sea level rise on coastal hydrology and the quality of water resources

Topics & Ideas: Geology

• The impact of tectonic activity on the East African rift valley
• The role of mineral deposits in shaping ancient human societies
• The impact of sea-level rise on coastal geomorphology and shoreline evolution
• Investigating the role of erosion in shaping the landscape and impacting desertification
• The impact of mining on soil stability and landslide potential
• The impact of volcanic activity on incoming solar radiation and climate
• The role of geothermal energy in decarbonising the energy mix of megacities
• The impact of Earth’s magnetic field on geological processes and solar wind
• The impact of plate tectonics on the evolution of mammals
• The role of the distribution of mineral resources in shaping human societies and economies, with emphasis on sustainability

Topics & Ideas: Soil Science

• The impact of dam building on soil quality and fertility
• The role of soil organic matter in regulating nutrient cycles in agricultural land
• The impact of climate change on soil erosion and soil organic carbon storage in peatlands
• Investigating the role of above-below-ground interactions in nutrient cycling and soil health
• The impact of deforestation on soil degradation and soil fertility
• The role of soil texture and structure in regulating water and nutrient availability in boreal forests
• The impact of sustainable land management practices on soil health and soil organic matter
• The impact of wetland modification on soil structure and function
• The role of soil-atmosphere exchange and carbon sequestration in regulating regional and global climate
• The impact of salinization on soil health and crop productivity in coastal communities

Topics & Ideas: Environmental Chemistry

• The impact of cobalt mining on water quality and the fate of contaminants in the environment
• The role of atmospheric chemistry in shaping air quality and climate change
• The impact of soil chemistry on nutrient availability and plant growth in wheat monoculture
• Investigating the fate and transport of heavy metal contaminants in the environment
• The impact of climate change on biochemical cycling in tropical rainforests
• The impact of various types of land-use change on biochemical cycling
• The role of soil microbes in mediating contaminant degradation in the environment
• The impact of chemical and oil spills on freshwater and soil chemistry
• The role of atmospheric nitrogen deposition in shaping water and soil chemistry
• The impact of over-irrigation on the cycling and fate of persistent organic pollutants in the environment

Topics & Ideas: Environmental Economics

• The impact of climate change on the economies of developing nations
• The role of market-based mechanisms in promoting sustainable use of forest resources
• The impact of environmental regulations on economic growth and competitiveness
• Investigating the economic benefits and costs of ecosystem services for African countries
• The impact of renewable energy policies on regional and global energy markets
• The role of water markets in promoting sustainable water use in southern Africa
• The impact of land-use change in rural areas on regional and global economies
• The impact of environmental disasters on local and national economies
• The role of green technologies and innovation in shaping the zero-carbon transition and the knock-on effects for local economies
• The impact of environmental and natural resource policies on income distribution and poverty of rural communities

Topics & Ideas: Environmental Ethics

• The ethical foundations of environmentalism and the environmental movement regarding renewable energy
• The role of values and ethics in shaping environmental policy and decision-making in the mining industry
• The impact of cultural and religious beliefs on environmental attitudes and behaviours in first world countries
• Investigating the ethics of biodiversity conservation and the protection of endangered species in palm oil plantations
• The ethical implications of sea-level rise for future generations and vulnerable coastal populations
• The role of ethical considerations in shaping sustainable use of natural forest resources
• The impact of environmental justice on marginalized communities and environmental policies in Asia
• The ethical implications of environmental risks and decision-making under uncertainty
• The role of ethics in shaping the transition to a low-carbon, sustainable future for the construction industry
• The impact of environmental values on consumer behaviour and the marketplace: a case study of the ‘bring your own shopping bag’ policy

Examples: Real Dissertation & Thesis Topics

While the ideas we’ve presented above are a decent starting point for finding a research topic, they are fairly generic and non-specific. So, it helps to look at actual dissertations and theses to see how this all comes together.

Below, we’ve included a selection of research projects from various environmental science-related degree programs to help refine your thinking. These are actual dissertations and theses, written as part of Master’s and PhD-level programs, so they can provide some useful insight as to what a research topic looks like in practice.

• The physiology of microorganisms in enhanced biological phosphorous removal (Saunders, 2014)
• The influence of the coastal front on heavy rainfall events along the east coast (Henson, 2019)
• Forage production and diversification for climate-smart tropical and temperate silvopastures (Dibala, 2019)
• Advancing spectral induced polarization for near surface geophysical characterization (Wang, 2021)
• Assessment of Chromophoric Dissolved Organic Matter and Thamnocephalus platyurus as Tools to Monitor Cyanobacterial Bloom Development and Toxicity (Hipsher, 2019)
• Evaluating the Removal of Microcystin Variants with Powdered Activated Carbon (Juang, 2020)
• The effect of hydrological restoration on nutrient concentrations, macroinvertebrate communities, and amphibian populations in Lake Erie coastal wetlands (Berg, 2019)
• Utilizing hydrologic soil grouping to estimate corn nitrogen rate recommendations (Bean, 2019)
• Fungal Function in House Dust and Dust from the International Space Station (Bope, 2021)
• Assessing Vulnerability and the Potential for Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) in Sudan’s Blue Nile Basin (Mohamed, 2022)
• A Microbial Water Quality Analysis of the Recreational Zones in the Los Angeles River of Elysian Valley, CA (Nguyen, 2019)
• Dry Season Water Quality Study on Three Recreational Sites in the San Gabriel Mountains (Vallejo, 2019)
• Wastewater Treatment Plan for Unix Packaging Adjustment of the Potential Hydrogen (PH) Evaluation of Enzymatic Activity After the Addition of Cycle Disgestase Enzyme (Miessi, 2020)
• Laying the Genetic Foundation for the Conservation of Longhorn Fairy Shrimp (Kyle, 2021).

Looking at these titles, you can probably pick up that the research topics here are quite specific and narrowly-focused , compared to the generic ones presented earlier. To create a top-notch research topic, you will need to be precise and target a specific context with specific variables of interest . In other words, you’ll need to identify a clear, well-justified research gap.

Need more help?

If you’re still feeling a bit unsure about how to find a research topic for your environmental science dissertation or research project, be sure to check out our private coaching services below, as well as our Research Topic Kickstarter .

Need a helping hand?

12 Comments

research topics on climate change and environment

Researched PhD topics on environmental chemistry involving dust and water

I wish to learn things in a more advanced but simple way and with the hopes that I am in the right place.

Thank so much for the research topics. It really helped

the guides were really helpful

Research topics on environmental geology

Thanks for the research topics….I need a research topic on Geography

hi I need research questions ideas

Implications of climate variability on wildlife conservation on the west coast of Cameroon

I want the research on environmental planning and management

I want a topic on environmental sustainability

It good coaching

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Water Supply Challenges in Rural Areas: A Case Study from Central Kazakhstan

Alua omarova.

1 Department of Public Health, Karaganda Medical University, Gogol Street 40, Karaganda 100008, Kazakhstan; ur.liam@2191_aula (A.O.); zk.umgk@vehsilak (M.K.); zk.umgk@avotebmagamsod (R.D.)

Kamshat Tussupova

2 Division of Water Resources Engineering, Lund University, Box 118, SE-221 00 Lund, Sweden; [email protected]

3 Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Lund University, Box 221, SE-221 00 Lund, Sweden

Peder Hjorth

Marat kalishev, raushan dosmagambetova.

Rural water supplies have traditionally been overshadowed by urban ones. That must now change, as the Sustainable Development Goals calls for water for all. The objective of the paper is to assess the current access to and the perceived water quality in villages with various types of water supply. The survey was carried out during July–December 2017 in four villages in central Kazakhstan. Overall, 1369 randomly selected households were interviewed. The results revealed that even though villagers were provided with tap water, significant numbers used alternative sources. There were three reasons for this situation: residents’ doubts regarding the tap water quality; use of other sources out of habit; and availability of cheaper or free sources. Another problem concerned the volume of water consumption, which dropped sharply with decreased quality or inconvenience of sources used by households. Moreover, people gave a poor estimate to the quality and reliability of water from wells, open sources and tankered water. The paper suggests that as well decentralization of water management as monitoring of both water supply and water use are essential measures. There must be a tailor-made approach to each village for achieving the Sustainable Development Goal of providing rural Kazakhstan with safe water.

1. Introduction

The target task of the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 7.C was to halve the number of the population with no access to safe drinking water and basic sanitary facilities by the year 2015 [ 1 , 2 , 3 ]. Through implementing this target, the proportion of people who have access to a basic drinking water service grew from 81% to 89% from 2000 to 2015 [ 4 , 5 ]. However, a weakness of the MDGs monitoring was an insufficient attention to water safety [ 1 , 6 ], which became a key element of the target task for water supply and sanitation upon design of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 6).

According to the United Nations Resolution 64/292: “The human right to water entitles everyone to sufficient, safe, acceptable, physically accessible and affordable water for personal and domestic uses” [ 2 , 7 ]. Therefore, SDG 6.1 call for full coverage of safely managed drinking water by 2030. The “Safely managed drinking water” indicator includes the three following conditions: accessible on premises, available when needed and free from contamination [ 8 , 9 ].

This goal is a huge challenge for all countries, not only for low- and middle-income ones [ 10 ]. The commitment to “leave no one behind” requires a focus on rural areas, which is typically neglected [ 4 , 11 , 12 , 13 ]. About 844 million people on Earth do still not have access to basic water supplies and 79% of them are rural residents [ 14 ]. At the same time, 2.1 billion people have no safely managed drinking water supply system service. This means that 14.9% of the urban- and 45.2% of the rural population need improved services [ 9 ].

A person needs 50 to 100 litres of water per day to meet physiological and hygienic needs [ 15 , 16 , 17 ]. People facing a limit of 20 litres per capita per day will therefore be exposed to a high level of health concerns. Rural residents usually live in worse economic conditions than urban ones and this affects the volume of water use [ 18 , 19 ].

Kazakhstan is one of the countries on the Eurasian continent that experiences the most severe water shortages. Water shortage and its poor quality have been determined as vital issues threatening the future prosperity of the country [ 20 , 21 , 22 ]. Furthermore, in Kazakhstan the coverage of water supply in the urban and rural areas differ significantly. Approximately 90% of urban people have access to safely managed drinking water, whereas in the rural areas this rate is only 28% [ 5 , 23 ]. Therefore, rural areas constitute the greatest challenge in the efforts to provide safe water for all.

The objective of the paper is to assess the current access to and the perceived water quality in the villages with various types of water supply. Although official statistics on water access per person in each village are available, that do not reflect the complex realities of the current situation. Therefore, a questionnaire survey was carried out in villages in the central part of Kazakhstan to illustrate this complexity and the obtained data was compared with the official one. The factors affecting the volume of water consumption and preferences to use alternative sources among centralized water supply users were identified. In addition, people’s satisfaction with the quality of drinking water and the reliability of different services were evaluated.

2. Materials and Methods

2.1. source description.

Drinking water is domestic water used for both drinking and hygiene purposes [ 24 ]. It can be supplied from different sources. Figure 1 shows the six available sources for such water in Kazakhstan. Centralized water provision is distributed through taps and standpipes, with water supplied from either surface or groundwater and this water is usually treated. Standpipes are provided along the pipelines at specified intervals. However, tap water inside a house is available only at the expense of a house owner. The government provides the centralized water supply, therefore the local administrative authority shall regularly check it for the presence of contaminants. Decentralized water supplies from boreholes and wells do not have any delivery services to houses and can be used public or individual. A permit for drilling new boreholes and wells is provided by the local administrative authority based on prior investigation of the field. They are also intended to do regular water quality tests throughout the operation period. However, the population sometimes use unregistered boreholes and wells, which means no control by the local administrative authority. Other sources of drinking water, such as tankered water and water from open sources, are not considered safe. However, due to the absence of water supply alternatives tankered water is included in official statistics and is regarded as a makeshift measure for drinking water supply provision for the population. Water is delivered to villages in a tanker, usually once a week and people pay for each litre on site. A company selected by the local administrative authority is responsible for a timely delivery and for the quality of water. Finally, an open source can be a spring, river or lake. They are completely absent in the official statistics and are utilized by individuals [ 25 ].

Sources of drinking water.

Rural people have to use multi-sources due to the lack of a stable water supply system in the villages. Households usually classify them based on their purpose for using water [ 26 ]. For instance, tap water for drinking, wells for hygiene, rainwater and thawed water for garden irrigation, etc.

2.2. Area Description

The study was carried out in the Bukhar-Zhyrau district (49°57.21′ N–73°43.01′ E, 500–700 m elevation, 14,576 km 2 ), located in the central part of Kazakhstan. The climate is continental with an average temperature of +19 to +21 °C in July and −15 to −17 °C in January, in addition to an average annual precipitation of 300–350 mm. The topography is flat and most of the territory of the district is covered by the Kazakh Uplands. A population of 64,683 (in 2017) live in 67 villages scattered throughout the region [ 27 ].

Groundwater is the main water resource and the population is provided with various types of water supply. Centralized piped water supply is used by 51,752 people, including 6083 standpipe users and 45,669 in-house water conduit users. Decentralized water supply is used by 12,431 people, including 9001 borehole users and 3430 well users. Finally, tankered water is used by 500 people [ 27 ]. To make a complete pattern of basic advantages and disadvantages of water supply in the region under study four villages, each with the largest percentage of users of one of the three types of water supply, were selected for further investigation ( Table 1 ): Botakara with mixed (both centralized and decentralized), Dubovka and Karazhar—centralized, and Asyl—tankered water supply.

Number of population in investigated villages by type of water supply according to the official data and the sample size.

2.3. Questionnaire Development

The questionnaire was developed based on the findings of a pilot study conducted by Tussupova et al. [ 28 , 29 ] in the Kazakh and Russian language, since both Kazakh and Russian speakers reside in the region under study. An ethical approval was obtained from the Bioethics Committee (Karaganda State Medical University, Karaganda, Kazakhstan, Protocol #110 of 17.10.2016) and the questionnaire was accepted during a session of the Scientific Evaluation Committee (Karaganda State Medical University, Karaganda, Kazakhstan, Protocol #6 of 14.06.2017). This study was approved and verified by the local administrative authority of Bukhar-Zhyrau district. The respondents were aware that participation therein was voluntary and that they could renounce providing any information at any time without reasons. All the persons polled signed an informed data collection consent statement.

The aim of the questionnaire was to assess what sources were used by the rural population and their satisfaction with the quality and quantity of the drinking water supply. The questionnaire covered the following topics: type of source mostly used for drinking purposes, reasons for searching for other water sources despite having a tap at home, volume of water consumption, time spent on water collection, additional purchase of bottled water, household water treatment methods, perceived quality and reliability of water supply systems.

2.4. Sample Collection

2.4.1. calculation of sample size.

The survey was carried out during July-December 2017. First, the official data provided by the local administrative authority for information about water supply systems available in the given region was studied. Then 1369 randomly selected households in four villages were interviewed. Finally, the obtained data was analysed aided with STATISTICA 13.3 (StatSoft, Tulsa, OK, USA) software. The sample size was calculated using the following formula [ 30 ]:

where n is the required sample size; p and q is a part and its inverse value in each class of the general totality ( p = 0.5; q = 0.5); Z α is a constant (set by convention according to the accepted α error and whether it is a one-sided or two-sided effect) as shown on Table 2 :

Critical values of Z for standardized normal distribution.

N is general totality amount ( N 1 = 6252; N 2 = 4114; N 3 = 1035; N 4 = 294); ∆—the difference in effect of two interventions which is required (estimated effect size) (∆ = 5% ):

Provided inevitable loss amongst the participants in the course of the study (for various reasons), the calculated sample size was increased by 20%:

In the course of questionnaire survey 25 persons resigned from the investigation: four from Botakara; three from Dubovka; seven from Karazhar, and 11 from Asyl. Thus, the total number of the respondents was 1369 instead of 1394.

2.4.2. Calculation of Water Consumption

Those households that use the tap pay for each m3 of water according to the meter readings. The respondents indicated the volume of water consumption ( x ) according to the payment receipts for the last month. When analyzing, water consumption per person per day (L) was calculated by the following formula:

Households that use sources without any delivery services collect and store water in tanks. During the interview, the respondents indicated the volume of tanks ( x ) and how often they had to fetch water. According to the findings, water consumption per person per day (L) was calculated as follows:

2.5. Description of Respondents

The questionnaire included the answers of one family member over 18 years who was responsible for water use from each household. The overall burden of collecting and using water in population is usually much higher in women than in men [ 31 ]. Our results have also confirmed this fact, since 63% of respondents were women and the remaining 37% were men. The respondents were between 19–70 years old. On average, 80% of them had lived in the studied villages from birth and each household included one to nine persons. Since the selection of the households was randomized, the level of education within the communities surveyed was not specifically studied.

3.1. Villages with Access to Tap Water

Comparing the official data from Table 1 and the collected data from Table 3 , it was found that the residents often used alternative water sources, even though they were provided with tap water supply. According to official data, 42.55% of the population of Botakara village had a water pipe in a house and 7% of them used standpipes outdoors, but only 25.35% of the respondents indicated taps as a source of drinking water and 51.44%—standpipes. In addition, 34.49% of the villagers had registered boreholes, and 15.96% had registered wells in their yards. Nevertheless, our data showed that only 16.51% and 6.74% used this kind of sources.

Percentage of respondents by the drinking water sources according to the collected data.

The situation was different in Dubovka village. There, 100% of the population was provided with centralized water supply and 98.06% of them had water taps inside their houses ( Table 1 ). However, nearly half of the respondents indicated alternative water points as a source of drinking water due to the time limited water service ( Table 3 ). Private unregistered boreholes and wells were used by 23.52% and 17.34% of the respondents, respectively. Moreover, 15.44% of villagers preferred to use water from natural open sources.

A similar situation was observed in Karazhar village. According to the data in Table 1 , 100% of the population was provided with centralized water supply. Nevertheless, as many as about 78% of the respondents indicated other water sources: 28.57% had unregistered boreholes, 31.31% unregistered wells and 18.24% independently brought water from natural open sources ( Table 3 ). The central water supply in the village was served all year round on a scheduled basis, four hours in the morning and three in evening. According to the respondents’ description, tap water was muddy. Therefore, people had to let water run for a long time, as well as to settle and boil it before each use.

The amount of used water depended on a source of water supply used by households and the time required to transport water from a source to a house. The linear regression between the volume of water consumption, a water supply source and the time spent on water collection was moderately downhill (R = −0.633; p = 0.01) ( Figure 2 ). This relationship showed that in 99% of cases with increasing time of water transporting, its consumption decreased. A type of water source and the time of water transportation to a house explained 40% of the variation in water consumption among the respondents, the remaining 60% of the variation was caused by influence of other unaccounted factors.

Water consumption in terms of a water supply source used by households and the time spent on water collection.

As shown in Figure 3 , 27.21% of the respondents in Botakara, 27.55% in Dubovka and 17.63% in Karazhar bought bottled water. However, Karazhar village differed from the other two in the frequency and quantity of buying bottled water. In Botakara and Dubovka 50% of people who bought bottled water did this irregularly, while in Karazhar villagers had to purchase it two or three times a week. In the first two villages, residents bought average 4.18 and 4.71 litres at a time respectively. In Karazhar this number was 6.2 litres.

Additional purchase of bottled water.

Some households treated drinking water at household level ( Figure 4 ). In Karazhar 49.54% of the respondents used some methods of household treatment, while this number in Botakara and Dubovka was 26.28% and 25.42% respectively. For this treatment, 76.07% of the respondents who purified water in Karazhar said that they used a factory filter. More than half of them changed a filter once a month and spent an average of 885 tenge (US $2.48 as on August 31, 2018) on each piece.

Use of household water treatment methods in the villages.

Multiple p-level comparisons by the Kruskal-Wallis test showed that water from taps in houses, outdoor standpipes and boreholes was no different in satisfaction with the quality of drinking water and reliability of sources according to the respondents ( Table 4 ). Quality and reliability are not independent factors. System breakdown impacts both quantity and quality, as the water is frequently of poor quality after such an event. Thus, reliability was essentially a measure of how often there was a problem concerning the delivery of water of an acceptable quality. In Dubovka and Karazhar villages, there were statistically significant differences in the quality indicators of water taken from wells and open sources, in contrast to water from the sources mentioned above. The villagers in Dubovka who used wells and open sources were not satisfied with its quality and reliability, as they rated them as “poor” (81% and 71.73% respectively) and “unreliable” (94.06% and 86.7% respectively). Almost the same situation was observed in Karazhar: 66.87% of villagers were not satisfied with the quality of water from wells and 74.77% from open sources. Also, 76.6% and 85.11% of the respondents considered the use of wells and open sources respectively to be unreliable.

Level of satisfaction with the quality of used drinking water and reliability of sources according to the respondents’ assessment.

1 Significant at p < 0.05.

Figure 5 shows the subjective assessment of the price and quality of drinking water given by the respondents depending on a used water source on a scale from one to ten. They stated the quality of drinking water in points in accordance with their impression, where one point was low and ten points was good quality. The price was converted into points based on the impression of the cost of drinking water, where one point was acceptable and ten points was expensive. The ratio of quality and price was calculated as follows:

Subjective assessment of quality-price ratio on drinking water by the respondents.

The residents of Botakara gave a high estimate in comparison with the other two villages; the estimates in Karazhar were very low (not above 5.7 points for taps and standpipes). The assessment given by the villagers fell depending on a used water source in the following sequence: tap > standpipe > borehole > well > open source. In most cases, people believed that the costs of an agreement with a third party for drilling a well as well as independent water transportation from open sources did not conform to water quality. This number for water from wells in Botakara was estimated at 4.14 points, in Dubovka at 2 points and in Karazhar at 1.7 points. The residents of the last two villages also used open sources and rated them at 1.97 and 1.35 points respectively.

3.2. Villages with Tankered Water

In Kazakhstan, a number of villages have an acute water shortage due to the lack of sources in their territory. It is estimated that the economic condition of the villages is poor. The population is provided with limited volumes of tankered water, the quality of which is doubtful. At the time of the study, in the Bukhar-Zhyrau district, there were four similar villages. One of them was Asyl, where 294 people lived. All people there used tankered water. The distance of water delivery was 17 km from a water source.

In Asyl village, the collected data coincided with the official ones, but the reason was the absence of alternative source of drinking water supply in the territory. There was only one tanker for the whole settlement, which brought water once a week according to the schedule (every Friday at midday local time). Therefore, when the transport broke down, the population had no drinking water for two–four weeks. Water tankers must be cleaned and disinfected before use at least once every three months [ 32 ]. According to the interview with the driver, this requirement was not always met.

The average water consumption in the village was 41.67 litres per person per day. Some residents stated that they spent an average of 103 minutes (for round trip) for self-delivery of water from alternative sources to a house. The data showed that 68.78% of the respondents bought bottled water as needed for drinking and cooking only. In case of water shortage or lack of delivery, most villagers used rainwater and thawed water for hygiene purposes.

In the village 44.44% of residents indicated that they regularly treated drinking water at home, 24.87% of them boiled water before consumption, and 67.72% used a factory filter. However, the issue was that the population did not know how to operate it properly. This was evident from the fact that 50.26% of those who used filters at home had not changed them it from the moment of purchase.

In Asyl village, the level of satisfaction with the quality of water and reliability of the source was very low ( Table 5 ). Since 77.78% of residents believed that, its quality was “poor”, and 98.94% estimated the reliability of tankered water supply as “unreliable”. Furthermore, villagers considered that the price of tankered water was not in line with its quality. They rated it at only 2 points.

Level of satisfaction with the quality and reliability of tankered water supply according to the respondents’ assessment.

4. Discussion

Tap water installed in villages by the government was not able to fully satisfy the populations’ drinking water demands. There had been some constant interruptions in the systems due to technical problems, which in turn worsened the quality of the supplied water. The quality was further reduced, because the population had underused the system’s capabilities [ 33 , 34 , 35 ]. Even though villagers were provided with tap water by the government, significant numbers used water from alternative sources of an unknown quality. When analyzing the reasons that led to this situation, it turned out that respondents most often indicated in the questionnaire the following: doubts regarding the quality of tap water; use of other sources by habit, as they were accustomed to it during water scarcity; and availability of cheaper or free water sources. The villagers also explained that scheduled water supply was the reason for searching for other water sources despite having a tap at home. This was especially the case during summer time, when water consumption increased due to garden irrigation.

Another problem concerned the quality of water supply for the residents from unregistered boreholes and wells in the villages. These boreholes and wells were not tested for compliance with the sanitary standards before and during the operation. Due to acute water supply shortage, the population also had to use water from open sources; brackish water from underground sources recommended only for domestic purposes as well as rain and thawed water. This situation was regarded as highly unsatisfactory.

A study of the water use characteristics was greatly significant for a sustainable development of rural regions, especially in countries with a deficiency of water resources. The more time people spent on water transportation from a source to a house, the less water they consumed to the detriment of their physiological and hygienic needs. Moreover, the amount of water used dropped sharply with decreased quality or inconvenience related to a source of water supply used by households.

Water consumption among taps, standpipes and boreholes users was found to be 50 to 200 litres per person per day, while this number among open sources and tankered water users did not reach 50 litres per day. Other factors affecting the amount of water consumption included religious obligations, water price, family income and climate condition, as well as relations and intentions in regard to preservation of water resources [ 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 ].

The population considered additional purchase of bottled water and treating water at home to be desperate measures. Bottled water was needed in periods of acute water shortage, when percentage of purchase was especially high in the village with tankered water. Water was treated at home in villages where residents doubted the water quality and took responsibility for its additional treatment. People who were the most satisfied with the quality of used drinking water and reliability of sources lived in Botakara, because they did not use water from open sources, and it was in this area where the majority of boreholes and wells had been registered. The less satisfied people lived in Dubovka and Karazhar due to low quality of water from wells and open sources, and in Asyl because of tankered water. People gave a poor estimate to reliability of these sources, although they still consumed the water from them.

In spite of the fact that the government tries to provide rural regions with tap water supply, the study has revealed various challenges in this endeavour. It is necessary to find a balance between the quantity and quality of water. In villages where there is a need to prioritize access to sufficient water quantity, the water consumption can be increased by means of timely repair and maintenance of the system, which is in turn a guarantee of uninterrupted supply of drinking water. In villages where the water quality is the dominant factor, priorities should be directed to appropriate drinking water treatment methods and training to encourage the population to choose the right water source. To this end, there should be an emphasis on making the healthy benefits of tap water associated with its high microbiological quality widely known. Moreover, to reduce the stress on limited water resources, there is a need for a more effective management and implementation of water preservation measures as well as improvement of the technical conditions of water supply lines, and sewage facilities. There is also a need for efficient and hygienic water use training for the population.

The villagers thought that the costs of an agreement with a third party for drilling a well and independent water transportation from open sources as well as the price of tankered water were not in line with its quality. Even while there was one source of water for taps and standpipes in each village, satisfaction with its quality and reliability varied due to technical problems in water supply plants. Upon their assessment of the price and quality of drinking water subject to the water source used, the respondents gave more points to tap water than to standpipe in all villages under investigation. This was because in this case they estimated the quality of the water as well as the convenience service. Obviously, water from the centralized system cannot be considered to be safe as long as users occasionally prefer other, uncontolled sources.

5. Conclusions

Decentralization of water management, monitoring of both water supply and water use and a tailor-made approach to each village are necessary to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals objective of providing rural people with safely managed drinking water. Providing safe water supply to rural Kazakhstan will be a tremendous challenge that the government needs to tackle as soon as possible.

It is only in cooperation with the local community, government bodies can identify systemic sustainability problems, and develop and implement policies for water access in premises; water that is available as needed and free from contamination. This cooperation will also ensure sustainable public health and bring economic benefits to villages. Consequently, this analysis of consumer demand on the existing water supply systems in the villages and people’s preferences in choosing the source of drinking water can contribute to more effective water supply planning and, thereby, support a sustainable development of rural regions.

Author Contributions

A.O. and K.T. planned the structure of the study. A.O. studied the official data, and performed the questionnaire survey. A.O. carried out the analysis of collected data with supervision from K.T. A.O. wrote the first version of the paper; K.T., P.H. and M.K. contributed in an equal manner to the paper by adding comments and writing parts of the final paper, R.D. assisted in replying to the reviewer comments and making the final corrections of the paper.

This research received no external funding.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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Sharkey P , Cristancho JC , Semenza D. Deer Hunting Season and Firearm Violence in US Rural Counties. JAMA Netw Open. 2024;7(8):e2427683. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.27683

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Deer Hunting Season and Firearm Violence in US Rural Counties

• 1 Princeton University School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton, New Jersey
• 2 School of Education, University of California, Irvine
• 3 Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminal Justice, Rutgers University, Camden, New Jersey
• 4 Department of Urban-Global Public Health, Rutgers University, Camden, New Jersey
• 5 New Jersey Gun Violence Research Center, Rutgers University, Camden

Question   What is the association between the start of deer hunting season and shootings in rural US counties?

Findings   This cohort study examined variation within 854 rural US counties in the timing of the start of deer hunting season, in which modern firearms are used. The first week of deer hunting season was associated with a significant increase in shootings relative to the week prior.

Meaning   This study suggests that the start of deer hunting season is associated with a substantial increase in shootings, highlighting the role of firearm prevalence in gun violence.

Importance   Firearm violence is a major public health problem in the US. However, relatively little research has focused particular attention on firearm violence in rural areas, and few studies have used research designs that draw on exogenous variation in the prevalence of firearms to estimate the association between firearm presence and shootings.

Objective   To investigate the association between the start of deer hunting season and shootings in rural counties in the US.

Design, Setting, and Participants   In this cohort study, data from all rural US counties in states with available data on the timing of deer hunting season were matched with data on shootings from the Gun Violence Archive from January 1, 2014, to December 31, 2021.

Exposure   Shootings in the first 3 weeks of deer hunting season were compared with the week prior to the start of deer hunting season.

Main Outcomes and Measures   The main outcome was daily total shootings. The association between the start of deer hunting season and shootings was estimated using Poisson regression models to analyze change within counties while controlling for relevant calendar year, month of year, and seasonal effects.

Results   The sample included 854 rural counties with a mean (SD) population of 16 416 (18 329) per county and 5.4 (13.3) annual shootings per 100 000 people. The county fixed-effects specification analyzing the association between deer hunting season and shootings showed that relative to the week prior to deer hunting season, the incidence rate ratio for total shootings was 1.49 (95% CI, 1.13-1.95) for the first week of deer hunting season and 1.41 (95% CI, 1.02-1.94) for the second week of deer hunting season. Estimates remained consistent when excluding hunting accidents and were most pronounced in states with more hunting licenses per capita.

Conclusions and Relevance   In this cohort study of the association between the start of deer hunting season and firearm violence, results showed that the start of deer hunting season was associated with a substantial increase in shootings. The findings highlight the role of firearm prevalence in gun violence and suggest the need for focused policies designed to reduce firearm violence in areas with substantial hunting activity during the first weeks of deer hunting season.

Firearm injuries and deaths are a significant public health problem in the US. 1 , 2 A large body of research suggests that greater availability of firearms is associated with increased risk for firearm injury, accidental shootings, suicide, and homicide in the home, across US states, and among high-income nations throughout the world. 3 - 6 This research has been predicated on the premise that the prevalence of guns in a given home, community, or nation is likely to make violent incidents more injurious and more deadly. 7 - 12 However, to our knowledge, few studies have been designed to exploit plausibly exogenous variation in the prevalence of firearms in public and private settings to generate evidence on the association between firearm prevalence and shootings.

This study adds new evidence to the literature on firearm presence and gun violence by using variation in the timing of deer hunting season across US counties. Throughout much of the rural US, the start of deer hunting season is a major annual event that leads to an abrupt increase in the number of people with firearms in public and private spaces. 13 - 20 The timing of deer hunting season, or the date when residents can begin hunting deer with modern firearms, varies across states and, in some cases, across counties within states. This variation provides a natural experiment for assessing whether the opening of deer hunting season is associated with the number of shootings in rural US counties.

This study integrates several data sources spanning from January 1, 2014, to December 31, 2021, a period for which we collected data on both shootings and deer hunting season start dates. First, we created a county-level dataset using the date that deer hunting season starts and its duration. States typically have distinct seasons for different types of hunting. We focused on the earliest date that hunters can begin using modern firearms to hunt deer, which generally matches with the period with the largest deer harvest. The vast majority of hunters hunt big game, and deer hunting is by far the most common form of big game hunting. 14 , 17 For example, between one-fifth and one-third of the total annual deer harvested in Wisconsin are killed in the opening weekend of deer hunting season, and 70% of annual deer harvested are killed in the first 9 days of the season. 14 One study conducted in rural counties found that the percentage of male arrestees armed with a long gun increased 300% at the start of deer hunting season, providing evidence that the deer hunting season is associated with a sharp increase in the presence of firearms in public and private spaces. 14 The study was determined to be exempt from review by Princeton University’s institutional review board because it is not human participants research. The study adheres to the Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology ( STROBE ) reporting guideline for cohort studies.

Due to the absence of a centralized source for information on deer hunting season and variation within states, we coded the start of deer hunting season using diverse references, including state departments of fish and wildlife reports, hunting magazines, and newspaper notices. Dates were reported at the state level or by state-defined hunting zones, which often align with counties. We excluded all counties in Arizona, Iowa, Louisiana, Nevada, New Mexico, and Wyoming because it was not possible to match counties to specific deer hunting seasons due to within-state variation in deer hunting season start dates and misalignment between counties’ borders and hunting zones. The group of excluded states includes some with relatively high (Iowa and Wyoming), medium (Louisiana, New Mexico, and Utah), and low (Arizona) rates of hunting licenses per capita; thus, there does not seem to be a clear link between the prevalence of hunting in a state and the complexity of the timing and geographic variation in hunting seasons. Nonetheless, it is unlikely that the methods exploiting variation in the timing and location of deer hunting season can be used in these states, and our results pertain only to rural counties outside of these 6 states.

The second source of data is the Gun Violence Archive (GVA), which documents shootings across the US, including information about the incident, location, date, type of gun, and number of victims. 21 Gun Violence Archive data are based on various published sources, including media and government reports and local police department reports. Each recorded shooting is geostamped and includes the date of the incident, allowing us to merge each incident with our county dataset by location and timing. The GVA includes a field indicating if the incident was a hunting accident, based on media or police reports. A growing number of studies draw on data from the GVA because it is the only source that tracks all shootings across the entire country. 22 Research validating data from the GVA has found that total counts of homicides correspond closely with data collected and published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 22 However, recent work has shown that the GVA may undercount certain types of incidents, with a bias toward shootings with multiple victims and those involving women and children. 23 , 24

To create our sample, we classified all counties according to the National Center for Health Statistics urban-rural classification. 25 Research on the prevalence of hunting with firearms shows that participation is extremely low (and often not legal) in counties that are part of or near metropolitan areas and increases substantially in sparsely populated areas outside of central cities and suburbs. 14 For this reason, we reduced the final sample to include 854 counties not located in metropolitan areas and not adjacent to a metropolitan area. Figure 1 shows the location of counties included in the analysis. In the last step, we merged each state with the number of hunting licenses per capita, collected from the US Fish and Wildlife Service between 1980 and 2016. 10

The statistical analysis exploits variation in the precise timing of the start of deer hunting season across and within US counties to identify the association between deer hunting season and gun violence. Although in some states deer hunting season lasts longer than 3 weeks, data on deer harvests suggest that the number of deer killed typically increases sharply in the first week of the season, subsides by week 2, and decreases quickly in the weeks afterward. All models use a Poisson regression in which the outcome is the count of the number of total shootings on a specific day in the specified county. 26 We ran the same set of models using negative binomial regressions, and the results were extremely similar. All SEs adjust for heteroskedasticity and clustering at the county level. We report 95% CIs for all point estimates. We use 2-sided z score tests to determine statistical significance. Although we report 95% CIs for all estimates, we refer to results as statistically significant if P  < .05. Statistical analysis was performed with Stata/SE, version 2018.0 (StataCorp LLC).

The sequence of models begins with a specification that draws on variation across counties (equation 1 in eAppendix 1 in Supplement 1 ). The model includes indicators for each 7-day period before and after the start of deer hunting season, ranging from 3 weeks prior to the start of the season to the third week of the season. We included fixed effects for the calendar year, the day of the week (dummy indicators for Sunday through Saturday, with Monday as the reference), and 2 indicators for holidays—one for the period including the Wednesday to Sunday before and after Thanksgiving, and another for the period from December 23 through January 2.

We then estimated a second model including county fixed effects (equation 2 in eAppendix 1 in Supplement 1 ). In this second model, we compared the weeks after the start of deer hunting season with the weeks prior to deer hunting season within the same counties. 27 , 28 We used the same controls as in model 1. In a third model, we altered the outcome to exclude shootings labeled in the GVA as hunting accidents. This model allowed us to assess whether the association between deer hunting season and shootings was due simply to accidents occurring while hunting, or whether any association was instead due to shootings other than hunting accidents.

Last, we examined how results vary by the prevalence of hunting across states. Using a measure of the number of hunting licenses per capita, we grouped states into tertiles representing states with relatively low, middle, or high prevalences of hunting. We conducted the main analyses separately for each category of states to assess whether results were stronger in states with more hunting licenses per capita.

Figure 2 displays results from models focusing on total shootings for the 854 rural counties (mean [SD] population, 16 416 [18 329] per county; 5.4 [13.3] annual shootings per 100 000 people) in our analytical sample. Of the 854 counties in the sample, 305 had at least 1 shooting during the study period. The graphs show results from 3 models: the first comparing weeks before and after deer hunting season when pooling all counties together, the second making the same comparisons within counties (county fixed effects), and the third showing the county fixed-effects results after excluding hunting accidents. The similarity of results between the first 2 models suggests that findings are robust to the decision to make comparisons across vs within counties. Focusing on the left side of the graph, incidence rate ratios for weeks prior to the start of deer hunting season were close to zero and were not statistically significant, indicating no clear trend in shootings before the start of deer hunting season. This finding provides evidence that the timing of deer hunting season can be considered exogenous.

The point estimates shown in “Week 1 of deer hunting season” capture the association between the first week of deer hunting season and total shootings, relative to the week before deer hunting season ( Figure 2 ). The county fixed-effects specification shows that the incidence rate ratio was 1.49 (95% CI, 1.13-1.95) for the first week of deer hunting season and 1.41 for the second week of deer hunting season (95% CI, 1.02-1.94). There was no statistically significant association in the third week of deer hunting season.

The third set of models in Figure 2 excludes all shootings labeled as hunting accidents from the outcome measure. Results from this model were close to identical to the results including all shootings, with incidence rate ratios slightly smaller in magnitude. In this model, the incidence rate ratio was 1.38 (95% CI, 1.05-1.82) for the first week of deer hunting season and 1.37 (95% CI, 1.00-1.89) for the second week of deer hunting season.

Figure 3 shows results from county fixed-effects specifications estimated among states in the lowest third, middle third, and highest third of hunting licenses per capita. Reducing the sample of states led to less precise estimates, and we did not find a linear association between hunting licenses per capita and shootings. We did find, however, that the strongest association between deer hunting season and total shootings was in states with the highest number of hunters relative to the population. Among states in the top third of licenses per capita, the incident rate ratio for shootings in the first week of deer hunting season was 3.19 (95% CI, 1.86-5.49).

We conducted a set of additional tests of robustness, results of which are available in eAppendix 2 and the eFigure in Supplement 1 . First, we conducted an analysis that included information on the type of gun used in each shooting incident. We found that the increase in shootings after the start of deer hunting season was more pronounced for shootings with a handgun rather than a long gun. However, this finding should be interpreted with caution, as data on the type of gun used are incomplete for a large percentage of incidents in the GVA data. Second, we conducted a supplemental analysis mirroring the main results but focusing only on fatal shootings, rather than total shootings. Full model results are shown in eAppendix 2 and the eFigure in Supplement 1 . Results from our preferred county fixed-effects specification were extremely similar to models of all shootings; the incidence rate ratio for fatal shootings was 1.57 (95% CI, 1.11-2.21) for the first week of deer hunting season and 1.44 (95% CI, 0.98-2.10) for the second week of deer hunting season.

We analyzed the association between the start of deer hunting season and shootings in 44 states between 2014 and 2021. Our analysis produced 3 key findings. First, in our preferred models examining variation within counties, we found significantly higher rates of shootings in the first week after the start of deer hunting season relative to the week prior to deer hunting season. The magnitude of the association was smaller in the second week of deer hunting season and was close to zero by the third week. Second, the results were largely replicated when hunting accidents were removed from the analysis. Third, the association of deer hunting season with shootings was most pronounced in states with the greatest number of hunting licenses per capita. Taken together, these findings offer evidence that the start of deer hunting season has a strong association with gun violence. In the sample of rural US counties, more people were killed by gunfire in the first week of deer hunting season than in any other week of the calendar year.

Although the core finding from the analysis is clear, there are multiple ways to interpret this finding. One plausible interpretation is that the beginning of deer hunting season leads to more people walking through the woods with guns, which is associated with an increase in accidental shootings relative to the weeks before deer hunting season. Although it is true that the start of deer hunting season brings about an increase in hunting-related accidental shootings, these shootings are rare, as most hunting accidents do not involve firearms. 16 , 17 Models excluding hunting accidents produced results that were nearly identical to the main results, suggesting that our estimates were not due to accidental shootings.

A second plausible interpretation is that the association between deer hunting season and gun violence is due to an unrelated change that occurs at the same time as the beginning of deer hunting season. The main analysis shows clearly that the exact timing of deer hunting season, which varies from state to state and in some cases from county to county, is associated with a sharp change in shootings, providing evidence that it is associated with deer hunting season instead of some other change occurring around the same time. To bolster this evidence, we stratified states by the number of hunting licenses per capita and demonstrated that the findings are much stronger in states with a large hunting population.

A third plausible interpretation is that the findings are associated with the start of deer hunting season but due to behavioral shifts unrelated to firearms, such as people being out in public more often, sleeping less, taking time off from work to hunt, or consuming more alcohol. These behavioral changes might increase opportunities for shootings to take place and create conditions for interpersonal conflicts to turn violent. We are not able to fully rule out these mechanisms with our data; however, 1 prior study showed that the start of deer hunting season was associated with null effects on overall crime, as measured with data reported by police departments, as well as a reduction in alcohol-related arrests, suggesting that the start of deer hunting season is not causally related to broader patterns of alcohol-related behavior or more generalized criminal activity. 14 At the same time, the same study found that the number of male arrestees armed with a long gun in rural jurisdictions increased 300% with the opening of deer hunting season, suggesting that the prevalence of firearms around hunting season increases dramatically. 14

This evidence leads us to conclude that the most plausible explanation for the increase in shootings the week after the start of deer hunting season is the heightened presence of firearms in public and private spaces. This conclusion is supported by the supplemental analysis showing that the increase in shootings after the start of deer hunting season was more pronounced for shootings with a handgun rather than a long gun. Although the data on type of gun are incomplete for a large percentage of incidents, this additional evidence suggests the main results may be associated with a broader influx of guns into public and private spaces, rather than simply an increase in long guns used for hunting. 29 - 31 It will be helpful for future research to incorporate different methods and sources of data, including qualitative data on gun prevalence during hunting season and in other parts of the year, to disentangle these explanations.

There are limitations to the present study that provide opportunities for future research. First, we excluded 6 states from our analysis due to incomplete data about hunting season start dates across the years of the analysis; any conclusions should be drawn only about the states in our sample. Second, our study relies on shooting data from a single source, the GVA. Data from GVA have been shown to have a bias toward incidents that receive more media attention and do not include comprehensive counts of firearm suicides. 23 , 24 Considering that much of the literature on the prevalence of guns has focused on suicide, we consider this a natural extension of our research and encourage similar analyses with alternative data sources that provide details on the location and timing of suicides. Third, we analyzed a relatively small analytic sample given our focus on counties not in or adjacent to metropolitan areas. Although this decision is appropriate for studying the association between hunting season and gun violence, future research should seek similar approaches to studying shocks that lead to more guns in public and private spaces in more densely populated areas where most shootings take place.

Our findings align with a body of research showing that firearm prevalence is associated with an increase in the risk of firearm violence. Although our findings do not address state or federal policy, research showing that state-level firearm regulations reduce shootings is relevant to discussions of how states might respond. 7 States with more firearm regulations, especially policies such as waiting periods and background checks, have lower overall firearm death rates, including both homicide and suicide. 7 , 32 Enhanced firearm regulations that govern firearm storage, carrying, and purchasing, particularly in states where deer hunting is popular, may serve to reduce the number of shootings that occur at the onset of the hunting season. 4 , 7 , 12 , 32

Accepted for Publication: June 18, 2024.

Published: August 14, 2024. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.27683

Open Access: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the CC-BY License . © 2024 Sharkey P et al. JAMA Network Open .

Corresponding Author: Patrick Sharkey, PhD, Princeton University School of Public and International Affairs, Wallace Hall, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08540 ( [email protected] ).

Author Contributions: Dr Sharkey had full access to all of the data in the study and takes responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis.

Concept and design: Sharkey, Semenza.

Acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data: All authors.

Drafting of the manuscript: All authors.

Critical review of the manuscript for important intellectual content: Sharkey, Semenza.

Statistical analysis: Sharkey, Cristancho.

Administrative, technical, or material support: Sharkey, Semenza.

Supervision: Sharkey, Semenza.

Conflict of Interest Disclosures: None reported.

Data Sharing Statement: See Supplement 2 .

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Master of Arts in History

Whether your goals are related to research, teaching, or public service, our program will prepare you well for a successful and rewarding career.

Pursue What Interests You Most

The University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire's master of arts in history graduate program is intended for those who wish to increase their backgrounds in history and for those who intend to do further advanced work in history. The program is designed so graduate students can prepare themselves in an area of expertise that best meets their interests and needs. Areas of expertise may be defined by broad themes, topics, chronology, or geography. Courses are chosen by you, giving you the ability to personalize your degree and align it with your career goals.

Students are able to further customize their experience at UW-Eau Claire by choosing between two program options: 1) a 30-credit thesis option; or 2) a 33-credit non-thesis option. Those who choose the 30-credit thesis option will complete a traditional six-credit research paper and thesis. Those who pursue the 33-credit non-thesis option will take additional graduate coursework to complete degree requirements.

No matter your path, coursework throughout the program will broaden and deepen your knowledge and understanding of history and techniques of historical research. Through the study of current trends in history, you'll examine the emergence of history as a profession, major subfields in the discipline, methodologies, and models currently influencing the work of historians, and dominant issues historians are looking at today. The program is rooted in small reading and discussion seminars, allowing you to learn from experts in the field as well as students who, like you, are interested and passionate about the world of history.

Whether your professional goals are related to research, teaching, or public service, our supportive, expert faculty — combined with a rigorous, experiential curriculum — will prepare you well for the field you wish to enter.

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Both master of arts in history programs are intentionally structured so you can study the topics that most interest you. Choose from a variety of history courses, including those related to American history, American Indian history, public history, modern military history, comparative world cultures, and women’s history.

While pursuing your degree, you can expect close supervision and guidance from a faculty mentor. A counseling and advising system has also been devised with the intention of providing each student with a personalized program encompassing both breadth and depth. Your advisor will work with you directly to design a plan that will allow for the completion of program requirements in the most efficient way possible while still accomplishing your educational goals. 

UW-Eau Claire is known for its top-notch faculty. In fact, two of our history professors have been recipients of Wisconsin Professor of the Year awards. The history department also was a recent recipient of the University of Wisconsin Regents Teaching Excellence Award for Academic Departments and Programs.

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Where can the master of arts in history program lead me after graduation?

Graduates of the history master's degree leave UW-Eau Claire able to appreciate the historical method of searching for truth, make judgments about concrete issues and exercise careful analysis along the way. They are proficient at gathering, analyzing, and presenting material, and understand the complexity of human history and historical developments. These skills allow them to succeed in a variety of roles and organizations, including work in archives and historical museums across the nation. 

Our grads have also enjoyed success in securing teaching positions in secondary schools and many have found opportunities in government and business. Students have also found the program to be exceptional preparation for further graduate work at leading doctoral universities.

Those pursuing their master of arts in history at UWEC will choose between two program options: a 30-credit program including a thesis and a 33-credit, non-thesis program. Working closely with an advisor, you'll design a degree plan that will allow for the completion of program requirements in the most efficient way possible all while studying the topics that most interest you. 

Curriculum throughout the degree will help you to analyze and interpret historical developments through historical research, writing, and presentation. Coursework is intentionally designed so you can develop your professional identity as a historian and graduate with a strong knowledge of pertinent historical literature in the field you wish to enter.

Here are a few courses in Master of Arts in History at UW-Eau Claire.

Current Trends in History

Examines the emergence of history as a profession, major subfields today within the discipline of history, methodologies and models currently influencing the work of historians, and dominant issues presently engaging the attention of historians.

A description of acceptable topics and the precise nature of the thesis requirement is provided in the departmental program descriptions.

Readings in Area of Thesis

Independent study format. Reading in depth in area of concentration for thesis or research paper. Thesis/research paper adviser is instructor. Culminates in presentation of prospectus to thesis committee.

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August 12, 2024

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Mild cognitive impairment could be going unreported in rural areas of west Michigan, study suggests

by Corewell Health

Corewell Health and Michigan State University researchers are the first in the state to use de-identified electronic health records of more than 1.5 million patients to analyze incidence rates and risk factors of mild cognitive impairment, or MCI, in rural and urban areas in West Michigan.

Results showed that many cases could be going undetected among those living in rural communities in the area, and researchers will now use the findings to develop AI tools that can detect MCI earlier among patients across the country.

The retrospective study , which included 10 years of historical patient data, is now published in the journal Alzheimer's & Dementia: Translational Research & Clinical Interventions and is the first large-scale analysis representing most of the population of West Michigan, with some of its findings surprising study authors.

"While we had our suspicions about what we would find; we did not expect the potential rate of underdiagnosis of MCI in some of the rural areas in West Michigan to be so high," said Bin Chen, Ph.D., associate professor in the MSU College of Human Medicine and co-principal investigator of the study.

According to Chen, typically, individuals experience MCI before developing dementia. Yet, the study found that patients who progressed directly to dementia without a prior MCI diagnosis, also referred to in the study as MCI skippers, were three times more prevalent than those identified with MCI initially.

"This tells us MCI may be going unreported with some patients," Chen said.

David Chesla, co-principal investigator and senior director of research data management at Corewell Health Research Institute in Grand Rapids, Michigan, agreed and said that this underreporting is what may be causing the MCI incidence rates to be so much lower.

"Our hypothesis from the beginning of this work was that we would have underreporting of cognitive impairment in communities across West Michigan; we just didn't know to what extent," Chesla said. "Our suspicion was initially derived from national data that reports a growing incidence rate of MCI within our aging U.S. population. Our patient data mirrors a subset of the national data; however, our patient MCI incidence rate in West Michigan is significantly lower than national averages."

National averages can range from 10% to 18% depending on race, age and timeframe in which the data was collected.

Chesla also indicated that the research team decided to dive deeper into the geographic distribution of patients, allowing them to separate whether patients had an urban or rural location, something he said has not been done before. Doing this provided further evidence that potential underreporting exists with the ratio of MCI skippers to diagnosed MCI cases being 4.3 times higher in rural areas compared to 2.8 times in urban areas.

While lack of access to care in these communities along with other reasons could be driving the higher rate of underreporting, Chesla said that a limitation of the study was having to use information from 10 years ago when electronic record systems were in their earlier stages.

"Today, electronic health records are integrated across most health systems; however, with our work going back in time, there could be fragmentation of records that may be driving the underreporting as well," Chesla said.

Additional findings showed that while risk factors for MCI were similar between the rural and urban populations, the urban areas exhibited a larger array of risks including being African American as well as having hearing loss, inflammatory bowel disease, obstructive sleep apnea and insomnia. Most common risk factors of MCI include diabetes, stroke, Parkinson's disease and older age.

According to the researchers, the massive amount of data now gives them the ability to leverage artificial intelligence, or AI, to build high-performance machine learning models that can identify higher-risk patients earlier across the state and potentially across the country. It has been shown that early diagnosis is key to potentially reversing or delaying the progression of cognitive impairment.

"The goal is to integrate this tool into health care systems everywhere so it can assist physicians in detecting and managing MCI patients more effectively," Chen said.

But for now, Chesla suggests that if individuals are experiencing symptoms such as hearing loss, mood swings or some of the other more common symptoms, they should not hesitate to reach out to their physician or a health care provider to help.

"We are in an era where there are care plans and rehabilitation services that can aid in slowing, if not reversing, cognitive impairment when caught early," Chesla said.

The study was co-led by Xiaodan Zhang, a data scientist at MSU College of Human Medicine, and Martin Witteveen-Lane, a data engineer at Corewell Health, and supported by the Corewell Health-MSU Alliance and the National Institutes of Health.

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$1.5M grant will build global network to prevent exploitation of Indigenous data

Reseachers will use a $1.5 million National Science Foundation grant to connect groups of Indigenous Data Sovereignty advocates who will protect the way Indigenous data is collected and used on a global scale.

Researchers at the  University of Arizona Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health and the  U of A Native Nations Institute are establishing a framework that protects the way Indigenous data is collected and used around the world, thanks to a $1.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation.

For as long as researchers, health care providers and government agencies have studied Indigenous communities, there has been mistrust about the data collected. Indigenous peoples have raised concerns about who owns and profits from the data, as well as how it is used. Using the grant, the researchers, in partnership with colleagues from the University of California, Los Angeles and New York University, will leverage a worldwide system of policies, practices and collaborative norms geared to place Indigenous peoples as authorities over the way their data is collected, shared and controlled.

Stephanie Russo Carroll

Kris Hanning/U of A Health Sciences Office of Communications

"What we've seen from tribal governments is that being able to work and connect with other entities internationally and connect over some of the same experiences has been beneficial," said principal investigator Stephanie Russo Carroll , an associate professor at the Zuckerman College of Public Health with shared appointments as an associate research professor at the  Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy and the Native Nations Institute. "This grant provides funding in an arena where we've never had funding before: linking up existing research and policy-focused networks toward advancing Indigenous data sovereignty."

 The significance of these connections is echoed by Ibrahim Garba , a co-investigator on the project and an assistant research professor at the Zuckerman College of Public Health with a shared appointment as a senior researcher at the Udall Center and its Native Nations Institute.

"These links are key in a conversation that is newly emerging, involving numerous players handling various types of Indigenous data across multiple contexts," Garba said.

The project will bring together scholars who focus on Indigenous data sovereignty, law, policy, information management, data governance, genomic sciences and the history of technology to create training, resources and processes for researchers and research institutions such as universities, funders, federal agencies and publishers.

Carroll, who is Ahtna and a citizen of the Native Village of Kluti-Kaah in Alaska, will lead the establishment of an alliance among 12 Indigenous data sovereignty and governance networks that span the globe. Those networks include the  Global Indigenous Data Alliance and six Indigenous data sovereignty networks representing the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the Sapmi region, which spans northern Europe. 

The network will also include five international Indigenous data governance research collectives: the National Science Foundation-funded  Center for Braiding Indigenous Knowledges and Science , the  Equity for Indigenous Research and Innovation Coordinating Hub , the  Collaboratory for Indigenous Data Governance ,  Local Contexts and  Ngā Pae Te Māramatanga .

The project will create a web portal, dubbed the Indigenous DataSET (Sovereignty and Ethics Training) Hub, which will host and link to training, processes and documents meant to guide researchers and institutions.

Other plans include working to align scientific research with local Indigenous communities' data governance standards and protocols, supporting Indigenous data scholars, expanding the reach of the networks worldwide, and forging collaborations among Indigenous data sovereignty leaders and movements.

Project activities will work to disrupt contemporary data practices and use tools to reveal inherent biases in data collection, storage and circulation. Ultimately, the measures are designed to advance science in service to communities.

Carroll previously worked with international scholars to create the  CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance. The protocols promote Indigenous peoples' collective sovereignty over the application and use of their data and knowledge for their collective benefit.

The CARE Principles include the collective benefit of data collection and use, authority to control the data, and responsibility to the people affected, all driven by a code of ethics. They call for policies that are meant to protect Indigenous peoples, with control and guidance implemented by the tribes.

Carroll said Indigenous leaders have embraced the effort to connect entities in a global network with a shared cause of reestablishing connections with data, protecting data and collaborating on new policy ideas.

"What we've been noticing over the past six months or so is an explosion in tribal departments or tribes at large contemplating and beginning to draft tribal laws and policies around data, as well as federal and state government policy development," Carroll said. 

Other co-investigators include Nanibaá Garrison, an associate professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, and Jane Anderson, an associate professor at New York University. 

This research is supported by the National Science Foundation's Office of International Science and Engineering under Award No. 2412372.

A version of this article originally appeared on the U of A Health Sciences website.

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Rural industry revitalization can be energized by land transfer: a case study in guangxi zhuang autonomous region, china, 2013–2022.

1. Introduction

2. materials and methods, 2.1. study area, 2.2. index system construction, 2.3. data sources, 2.4. statistical analysis, 3.1. the inter-annual trend of rir and land transfer for the five cities, 3.2. the driving forces of rir, 3.3. the relationship between land transfer and rir, 4. discussion, 4.1. both rir and land transfer are closely bound up with the national favorable treatments to farmers, 4.2. the mechanism and analysis of positive effects of land transfer on rir from the target five cities in guangxi, 4.3. sustainable development recommendations of rir and land transfer for the five target cities in guangxi, 5. conclusions, author contributions, institutional review board statement, informed consent statement, data availability statement, conflicts of interest.

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Share and Cite

Yu, Y.; Lang, T.; Pan, M.; Dai, Q.; Liu, Y.; Huang, Y.; Lu, X.; Sun, L.; Wang, Z. Rural Industry Revitalization Can Be Energized by Land Transfer: A Case Study in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, China, 2013–2022. Sustainability 2024 , 16 , 6999. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16166999

Yu Y, Lang T, Pan M, Dai Q, Liu Y, Huang Y, Lu X, Sun L, Wang Z. Rural Industry Revitalization Can Be Energized by Land Transfer: A Case Study in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, China, 2013–2022. Sustainability . 2024; 16(16):6999. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16166999

Yu, Yaqun, Tao Lang, Min Pan, Qiming Dai, Youshun Liu, Yanjing Huang, Xueming Lu, Luyi Sun, and Ziyou Wang. 2024. "Rural Industry Revitalization Can Be Energized by Land Transfer: A Case Study in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, China, 2013–2022" Sustainability 16, no. 16: 6999. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16166999

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Plug-in pickups? Georgians may have hard time parting with gas-powered trucks, experts say

A few years back, James Cobb found himself on the receiving end of an entirely unexpected phone call from a man claiming to represent a foreign automaker. 

“He wouldn’t didn't tell me what company it was, but he wanted me to do a conference call with one of the Korean vehicle manufacturers,” Cobb explained in a recent phone interview. “They wanted to talk about pickup trucks.” 

At first glance, Cobb, a longtime history professor at the University of Georgia, might appear to be an unlikely source for that kind of industry intelligence gathering. 

But Cobb, who has written widely on the interaction between the economy, society and culture in the American South, understood the inspiration for the call. He had recently published an in-depth analysis of the pickup’s influence on a century of Southern sensibilities . 

The company turned out to be Hyundai, which is building a $5.5 billion electric-vehicle factory west of Savannah. 

When the call happened, Cobb quickly sensed what felt like a cultural chasm.  

“They had the idea that if you’re building a truck, your clientele is going to be nothing but the rednecks, the low-income population,” said Cobb, UGA’s Phinizy Spalding Professor Emeritus. “And they couldn’t kind of wrap their head around the idea that the pickup now has become something for people who live in metropolitan areas, kind of a reverse status symbol.” 

In affluent urban and suburban areas, a Benz or Beamer is increasingly likely to stay parked in the garage in favor of a Ford 150 or Toyota Tacoma, something that seemed like a foreign concept to Hyundai. 

“The [South] Koreans, I guess, have a more hierarchical view of society and culture, and I was hard pressed to persuade them of the difference here,” Cobb said.  

‘Superusers’ stall state’s emissions reductions 

The urban embrace of trucks and other light-duty passenger vehicles, along with an enduring rural connection to the pickup, combine to create a potential speed bump on Georgia’s road to lower climate-impacting emissions from the transportation sector.

For example, just the top 10% of the state’s light-utility vehicles in terms of fuel use, including pickups, account for more than one-third of Georgia’s total gasoline consumption, according to an analysis by Seattle-based clean energy advocacy organization Coltura. 

Those “superusers" burn an average of 1,876 gallons of gas per year, which is 4.5 times more than the state's typical passenger vehicle.

“The analysis reveals alarming trends that are preventing gasoline consumption from declining fast enough to meet state climate goals, despite the sharp increase in EV sales,” Coltura concluded. 

If those superusers switched to electric vehicles, the state’s transportation-related carbon emissions would be reduced by 12.8%, and overall carbon pollution would fall by 6.1%, according to the report. 

That tradeoff may be a tough sell for many of those drivers, especially considering that nearly half of them live in rural areas, according to Coltura. 

The road to 'status inversion'

Overall, Coltura estimates there are 1.2 million pickups in Georgia, making them a significant contributor to the state's heat-trapping pollution that causes climate change.

Many of those trucks traversing country roads regularly carry some sort of cargo, often for longer distances than their urban counterparts.

But, as Cobb has observed in his research – and in his own life – utility has become less of a factor for pickups since Ford produced the first models a century ago.

For Cobb, a pickup was his family’s only vehicle until he was a teenager. As a historian, he became fascinated with the pickup’s evolution into a cultural icon of sorts. 

Industry access: Grant aims to plug underserved Black communities into electric transportation

“It just went from being kind of like an artifact or indicator of country life to being kind of a toy, a symbol of an urban, metropolitan affluence and ease,” he explained.  

And he needn’t go far to see that phenomenon firsthand. 

"There’s some really pretty well off, very successful people who live up and down my street, and it’s either a Chevy or a GMC or a Ford pickup in front of practically every house,” Cobb said. “The bigger the house, the more likely there'll be a pickup parked in front of it.” 

This “status inversion,” as Cobb called it, in many ways has come to epitomize the cultural divide between urban centers and smalltown America – one that also fuels conflicting attitudes about electric vehicles. 

“People in rural areas are more likely to really use their trucks as trucks,” he explained. “And so, they may be looking at a different set of considerations in buying a new truck than somebody who basically is their banker who just likes to feel macho by driving around in the shiny, big old, very ultra comfortable pickup truck.” 

At the same time, not-so-wealthy truck owners willing to ditch their less-luxurious light-utility vehicles for any type of EV have a full range of options including the Chevy Bolt (with a starting price of $28,000 for a 2024 model), Nissan LEAF ($29,000) and Mini Cooper Electric ($30,000). 

However, a rural resident who prefers a truck for its utility would need to shell out at least $50,000 for a base 2024 Ford F-150 Lightning, the most affordable electric pickup.

Other electric pickups include the Tesla Cybertruck (starting at $61,000), Chevrolet Silverado ($74,800), the Georgia-built Rivian R1T ($80,000), and GMC Hummer ($99,000).

Follow the money

One other factor making the shift to electric pickups more costly: Unlike sedan and SUV EVs, plug-in pickups have been on the market for just a few years, so cheaper used models aren’t much of an option.  

That can put electric trucks out of reach for many people outside the state’s larger population centers who rely on their pickups for hauling, towing or other practical uses.  

“The likelihood is that the disposable income is going to be lower for potential (pickup) truck drivers living out in the sticks as opposed to in the 'burbs,” Cobb said. 

Statistics support that assumption. 

The estimated combined median household income in Georgia’s six largest counties in 2022 was $76,500 (No. 6 Chatham’s was $66,200), while the statewide median was $71,355, U.S. Census data shows. 

In Georgia counties classified as rural, the median household income was just $42,300, according to the State Office of Rural Health. 

Simply put, a smaller chunk of residents in sparsely populated areas can afford an electric pickup than inhabitants of higher-income urban and suburban communities, making them more likely to hang onto their gas-powered trucks. 

A broader look at EV trends using state and federal data confirms an overall gap based on where people live. 

The same six largest counties account for about 40% of the state’s total population, yet they’re home to 68% of all registered electric vehicles, an analysis of statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau and Georgia Department of Revenue Motor Vehicle Division shows.  

Plugging in: Georgia accelerates past the 75,000 mark for electric vehicles

A confluence of factors

Cost aside, the same kinds of deeply rooted cultural characteristics that help define rural Georgia also are at play in the state’s shift to electric vehicles. 

“Let's face it, there's still enough rustics in this state – and thank God for it – that if you’re the first guy to show up in an electric pickup truck, you’re probably going to take some ribbing, regardless of how well suited it is for your own purposes,” Cobb said.  

A perceived elitism attached to electric vehicles also can be a turnoff for folks who feel looked down upon by snooty city slickers. 

“There's no doubt in many circles that people who are pushing EVs are viewed as pinko liberals, and so it has a little bit of a political stigma on it,” Cobb noted. 

How – and how far – people drive also factors into decisions about shifting to EVs. 

Rural drivers often must travel longer distances to get to work, school or shopping, but don’t have the same access to chargers that vehicle owners in heavily populated areas do.  

The resulting EV-related range anxiety will continue to be one of a handful of factors in vehicle electrification for rural Georgia, Cobb concluded. 

“If I was doing a flowchart, I would just say that you take all the concerns and questions that people have about EVs to start with, and then throw in the (notion) that it’s a liberal idea, and it cuts into your independence because you’ve got to get it charged as opposed to going to any number of gas stations where you could get another fill-up, and the cost of owning and operating one,” he said. “So, it's part structural, part economic and part cultural.” 

As for Hyundai, it did dip its toe into the the pickup market in 2022 with the introduction of the Santa Cruz, a gas-powered crossover SUV equipped with the smallest bed among available trucks. The Santa Cruz, with a starting price of $26,650, most closely resembles the former Subaru Baja, which was retired in 2006 but is returning in 2025 as more of a traditional truck.

John Deem covers climate change and the environment in coastal Georgia. He can be reached as [email protected] .