Collaborative Research: Spatial Variability in Adaptations to Environmental Change

This research examines how living in a border region shapes how residents alter their behavior due to increasing environmental variability such as shifts in temperature and precipitation patterns. Results can inform community-based organizations in border regions on how to best support vulnerable communities when challenged by environmental change and its consequences. Empirical analyses could also provide regional, state, and federal institutions with high-resolution data that could improve policymaking at multiple scales. Faculty leaders will mentor three graduate students, two of whom will be trained at University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV), the second largest Hispanic-Serving Institution in the US, with 91% of students identifying as Hispanic and more than half being first-generation. Utilizing ethnographic research including document review, participant observation, semi-structured interviews, and surveys along with community collaboration and geo-spatial analyses over a period of 36 months of fieldwork, this study aims to address this need by investigating the overarching research question: How does living within a border region shape experiences of everyday adaptations to environmental change? This study seeks to answer this question through the following objectives: (1) Investigating how border specific attributes (e.g., surface flooding and its effects in the region, increased surveillance and security, informality) influence how environmental change is unfolding in the research site; (2) Documenting the ways people use everyday adaptations to adapt to environmental change in the region; and (3) Analyzing how adaptation and border policies respond to and reflect social and environmental changes and (Obj1) everyday adaptations (Obj2). This research is a collaborative effort from scholars in anthropology, environmental social science, sociology, and geoscience at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley and the University of Delaware. Findings will expand theoretical and empirical understanding of the ways that border environments constrain adaptation to environmental change. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.