Postdoctoral Researchers

Karl Mertens studies behavior, decision making, and cooperation across societies and economic conditions. Currently, he shares a long term research site in Mozambique with John Ziker and is a member of an interdisciplinary project in Fennoscandia. Research in Mozambique explores 1) how people make different decisions under the same social and environmental conditions, and 2) how kinship and reciprocity impact reproductive success, mobility, and food security. Research in Fennoscandia examines how cumulative impacts of climate and development are linked across the physical environment, plant species, and herbivores with a special emphasis on how reindeer herders respond to novel climate conditions and industry.

Education
PhD: Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior, Boise State University

MA: Anthropology, Boise State University

BA: Social Studies: History, Minnesota State University, Mankato

Research interests
Behavioral ecology and plasticity, cooperation mechanisms, arctic anthropology, statistical inference

Biography

Sarah Whitaker is a biocultural anthropologist who studies how social and ecological systems interact to shape human and animal well-being under conditions of climate and environmental change. Her current research projects address how people make decisions with uncertain climate information and how climate and environmental changes are affecting agricultural practices and human well-being in rural mountain areas. Additional research projects concern cultural models of pain among endurance cyclists, biosecurity and animal welfare on smallholder farms, and the well-being of beekeepers in mountain areas.

Education

Ph.D., Anthropology, Emory University

M.A., Anthropology, Emory University

B.S., Double Major in Biology and History, Duke University

Research Interests

Human-environment interactions, socio-ecological systems, climate and environmental change, flooding, health and well-being, mountain areas, agriculture