RESEARCH, SCHOLARSHIP, AND
CREATIVE ACTIVITY
OCTOBER 2011
Kinship Behavior in Social Organization
Professor of Biology Christine Maher studies the evolution of
social behavior – the understanding how ecological factors
shape the behavior patterns of individuals and influence their
reproductive success. For the past 14 years, she has led a long
term study of woodchucks at Gilsland Farm in Falmouth,
Maine. The woodchuck (or groundhog) was chosen for two
reasons: 1) it is the least social member of the marmots and
thus represents an early stage in the development of sociality,
and 2) it is behaviorally flexible, meaning that different
populations exhibit different degrees of sociality. Each season,
individuals are captured and marked so they can be followed
through time. As a result, the genealogy of nearly every
woodchuck in the population is recorded, sometimes going
back four or five generations. The research has shown that
kinship does play an important role in the social organization.
Both males and females often postpone leaving home until their
second summer, with some individuals never leaving that natal
territory, which leads to the establishment of clusters of kin that
share space and interact with each other. Thus, the population
represents an early stage of sociality.
More recently, behavioral syndromes or consistent individual
differences in behavior were examined. Individuals’ responses
were recorded in an open arena, particularly their tendency to
explore a new environment, as well as responses to a mirror
image of themselves and flight responses to a simulated
predator. Together, these responses, which fall along a
continuum of shy/bold and proactive/reactive personalities,
may shed light on decisions made about whether and when to
disperse, where to settle, and how to interact with individuals
that live nearby. In the last two years, she has discussed various
aspects of her research in four articles published in the Journal
of Mammalogy.
Newsletter produced by the Office of Research Administration
and Development, under the leadership of Samantha LangleyTurnbaugh, Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs –
Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity.
The 2011 Maine Health Workforce Summit
The Maine Health Workforce Forum was established in 2005 by
the Maine Legislature to address Maine’s current and projected
workforce needs. The forum is a statewide group of public and
private sector stakeholders committed to ensuring a sufficient and
qualified health and long-term care workforce in Maine.
Membership in the forum is open and voluntary and includes
employers, representatives of health professional associations,
licensing boards, educational institutions, and Maine Departments
of Health and Human Services, Labor and Education, and the
Center for Disease Control and Prevention. The purpose is to
ensure a high level of communication, information sharing,
coordination, collaboration, planning, resource development,
program alignment, and data collection and analysis among the
various public and private organizations, educators, and
practitioners concerned with workforce development.
A product of the forum, the 2011 Maine Health Workforce
Summit, titled The State of the State’s Health Workforce:
Aligning Resources to Meet Maine’s Needs, will include opening
comments by Governor Paul LePage, as well as a panels
comprised of the commissioners of DOL, DHHS, DOE, and
DECD, health employers, and educators. Project Director Elise
Scala and Principal Investigator Kay Dutram, together with
Cutler Institute staff, provide support to the forum and are taking
the lead in organizing the summit.
Personal Agency and Cognitive Stage
Development
Twelve years ago, LAC Leadership Studies’ Leigh Mundhenk became interested in how students develop personal agency – the
belief that they have the authority to manage their own lives. This interest emanated from observations that some students expect the
teacher to be the classroom authority and simply lecture, while others enjoyed seeing themselves as constructors of knowledge, with
classroom discussion and debate. While presenting this paradox with a colleague and editor of a major pedagogy journal, she made
the decision to conduct a literature search on cognitive stage development theory. What she learned from this search, particularly the
work of William Perry, was that people go through predictable stages of cognitive development. In the earliest stage, people see the
world in black-and-white terms, believing that knowledge comes to them from external authorities. People develop into later stages,
passing through stages of relativism and multiplicity, respecting different and contradicting views, to the stage where they construct
their own knowledge and beliefs. Understanding cognitive stage development has been the focus of most of her scholarship, having
written about its application in career counseling, leadership readiness, and student self-assessment. Her most recent publication was
an article co-written with LAC Leadership Studies Professor and Research Council co-chair Liz Turesky in Academic Leadership:
The Online Journal.
Got a research story? Please help us spread the word about the exciting research and scholarship happening at USM!
Send us your short (<300 word) stories that detail your scholarly endeavors to share with faculty, staff and administrators
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audience. Email your story to lalvarez@usm.maine.edu.