VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Kickin' it in 'the Hood:' Soccer and Social Inclusion in Global Toronto
Keywords: Immigrant Integration
Social Inclusion
Social Justice
Sport for Development
Urban Toronto
Youth Sport

This dissertation explores if, how, and why participation in a community-based soccer program affected the lives of marginalized immigrant youth in global Toronto. Situated in one of Canada’s most prominent ethnic communities (St. James Town), the researcher chronicles six years of immersive ethnographic fieldwork as a community soccer coach supervising a public intra-sectoral program partnership between a local community recreation centre and a high school. Emergent data was analyzed using a transdisciplinary theoretical approach based upon Affect philosophy’s permeation through diverse fields of social science literature, ranging from (im)migration/urban sociology, post-structural feminism, and post-subcultural youth studies. A Theory of Social Inclusion Through Sport was next advanced that was grounded in the program’s capacity to engage, develop, and integrate local youth in a manner that also facilitated diverse forms of belonging. Though ‘subjective’ (socio-emotional) aspects of inclusion were found to emerge from participation, findings regarding more ‘objective’ (socio-structural) components remained ambiguous. While engagement in programming made youth feel mostly included in their everyday lives, the localized character of their experiences limited community sport’s ability to attend to larger structural forces of exclusion from society. Thus, my findings call into question the capacity of community-based sport programs to facilitate immigrant youth’s full inclusion into society if not augmented by additional forms of social supports. Policy recommendations to attend to this limitation and bolster this program model are advanced in the final chapter. This study should be of interest to scholars within the international fields of sport-for-development and sport sociology who are increasingly examining how sport programs may impact the integration experiences of immigrant youth living ‘on the margins’ of ‘global’ cities.
Microfibers in a Freshwater Ecosystem: Sources, Fate, Effects, and Mitigation
Keywords: Effects
Fate
Microfibers
Microplastics
Mitigation
Sources

Microfibers (anthropogenic fibers <5mm) are found in ecosystems around the world. Although microfibers have historically been lumped into the category of microplastics, they encompass a broader suite of contaminants. Microfibers reported in the environment are diverse including synthetic (e.g., polyester, nylon), semisynthetic (e.g., rayon, modal), and natural (e.g., cotton, wool) materials. Microfibers encompass more materials than microplastics, but microfibers are similar to microplastics in that they include chemical additives and accumulate ambient chemicals from the environment. Although there is some research on the prevalence, fate, and effects of synthetic (or plastic) microfibers, there are still many unknowns regarding the chemicals they may transfer, their environmental fate, and any potential toxic effects they may cause. Such research gaps are especially prevalent for non-plastic (or natural) microfibers. My PhD research addresses these gaps. I examine the sources, fate, and ecological impacts of both plastic and non-plastic microfibers. I then investigate a mitigation strategy for microfiber capture relevant to a known source of microfiber pollution, washing machines. Overall, I find: many types of microfibers contaminate freshwater fishes, including lake trout (Salvelinus namaycush) and rainbow smelt (Osmerus mordax) (Chapter 2); cotton and polyester microfibers have similar effects on the benthic invertebrate, Chironomus dilutus (Chapter 3), but microfiber material type has different impacts on the bioaccumulation of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) and quantities of fatty acids in rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) (Chapter 4); and washing machine filters are an effective mitigation strategy for reducing microfiber emissions at a community-scale (Chapter 5). An understanding of how a diverse suite of microfibers contaminate and affect biota can advance microplastics research and inform effective policy.
The Experience of Music Therapy for Younger Adults in Long-Term Care: A Phenomenological Inquiry
Keywords: long-term care
music therapy
psychotherapy
therapeutic programs
younger adults

This phenomenological inquiry seeks to understand the subjective experience of regular engagement in music therapy sessions for younger adults in long-term care (18 to 64 years). Although the benefits of music therapy have been linked with improved outcomes in social, emotional, communication, behaviour, and physiological functioning with a variety of client populations, the impact for younger residents in long-term care has not previously been explored. This population who differs greatly in age, and physical and cognitive abilities from their older counterparts in long-term care has scarcely been the focus of research and is not well understood. This study seeks to understand the needs, motivations, perceptions and experiences from the self-reported and subjective, lived experience of younger adults in long-term care. Through in-depth, semi-structured interviews, six participants revealed key themes while sharing their unique experiences in music therapy within the long-term care setting. The data generated from this research suggests several benefits of music therapy for this resident population, including social and emotional engagement and support, and the ability to inspire, provide meaning, access strengths, and provide a sense of escape. Results suggest that music therapy programming aligns with, and is able to provide the things that residents most value. It is hoped that these discoveries and insights may assist clinicians and policy makers in decisions about the nature of future therapeutic programs for this resident population.
Complementarity of Solar Induced Chlorophyll Fluorescence and the Photochemical Reflectance Index for Remote Estimation of Terrestrial Gross Primary Productivity
Keywords: Carbon Cycle
Climate Change
Leaf Area Index
Photochemical Reflectance Index
Solar Induced Fluorescence
Vegetation Phenology

Terrestrial vegetation helps mitigate the accumulation of CO2 in the atmosphere through photosynthesis, which locks CO2 into vast stores of vegetative material. However, the rate of this flux is itself sensitive to global change and may fluctuate in ways that are difficult to predict. Monitoring gross primary productivity (GPP) continuously across both space and time is thus critical to understanding the risks of continued climate change. This thesis evaluates satellite remote sensing measures to improve assessment of carbon uptake and explores the complementarity and confounding factors of two physiologically related spectral indices: solar induced chlorophyll fluorescence (SIF), and the photochemical reflectance index (PRI).An evaluation of the impact of land cover and latitude on SIF phenology across the Province of Ontario using a GIS approach shows higher SIF magnitudes in more densely vegetated land cover types, early start of season in urban environments, and delayed start of season in croplands. Exploiting the 2017 North American Solar Eclipse as a natural shading experiment over a mixed forest canopy at proximal scale indicates that changes in PRI can result from multiple scattering of light through a forest canopy. As SIF and PRI are highly sensitive to canopy structure, I devise and test methods to measure leaf area index from understory light sensors. I report a near 20-year record of canopy structure for a mixed forest site. Finally, I report the results of a comprehensive field campaign to characterize the causes of variability in SIF, PRI and GPP across diurnal, seasonal and interannual time periods. Variability in PRI and SIF yield are associated with changes in canopy chlorophyll content and canopy structure. The findings support emerging evidence that structure and radiation dominate SIF variation and highlight limitations of PRI in tracking light stress over long time series. The findings advance our ability to assess vegetation productivity from space and indicate factors that may confound our interpretation of remotely sensed spectral indices.
Children Do Science: Learning to Recognize Children’s Funds of Science Knowledge Expressed in a Community-based Research Club Initiative
Keywords: Community based research
Critical practitioner inquiry
Funds of knowledge
Informal science education
Science
Science education

Children do science. Yet, children from lower-income communities are less likely to be recognized for doing science. This deficit narrative bolsters the construction of systemic obstacles which complicate how educators recognize and mobilize children’s science (Carlone et al., 2014). This dissertation explores how science is socially and culturally constructed via school curriculum, the academy, and public science forums, such that they generate and gatekeep a world of science where there are insiders and outsiders (Dawson, 2014b). In collaboration with a community science club provider and an urban primary school in Central Canada, a new experimental after school science club was created. Twenty children aged 8 to 11 were joined by two staff members and me as a volunteer club facilitator, as we explored science concepts and worked towards a showcase presented to the school community. Using critical practitioner research (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 2009), I explored the affordances and challenges of supporting children’s funds of knowledge (FoK) (Moll et al., 1992), specifically their funds of science knowledge (FoSK) as expressed in the space of the club. I share four stories which weave together the data, my critical reflections, and relevant literature: 1) Coming to terms with STEM; 2) Robot FoSK—Child engineers and social innovators; 3) Slime and the scientific expression of children; and 4) The science centre—It belongs to us. The narrative analysis demonstrates the how children do science in a manner which aligns with the common characteristics of science, and the more expansive and creative qualities of children’s science. I make suggestions for how a FoSK framework can support educators to recognize and mobilize children’s science skills and knowledge as they learn. Further recommendations highlight the necessity of supporting children’s science talk, play, and creativity; the equitable potential of community-based informal science education; and the importance of interrogating one’s own power and capacity for recognizing FoSK. In sharing my experience, I hope to motivate researchers and educators to look inward and challenge their assumptions, personal and institutionalized, and adapt their practices to better support children as they do science.
Autophagy in the Susceptibility to Crohn's Disease
Keywords: autophagy
cell death
Crohn's disease
intestinal epithelium
mucosal immunology

Crohn’s disease (CD) has a profound impact on the quality of life of individuals living with this disease. In 2021, an estimated 300,000 people in Canada alone were living with either CD or ulcerative colitis (UC). CD causes discontinuous inflammatory lesions that can occur throughout the gastrointestinal tract but are most commonly located in the terminal ileum and colon. A combination of factors is thought to cause progression to CD, stemming from both a genetic predisposition and environmental risk factors, which together alter intestinal homeostasis, microbiota composition, and intestinal immune function. How intestinal homeostasis ultimately breaks down and leads to disease is not fully understood. A common coding variant of the autophagy protein ATG16L1 has been associated with risk for developing CD. Here, we explored a role for ATG16L1 in intestinal epithelial cells during acute small intestinal injury as well as recovery. We found that in the absence of ATG16L1 T cell-mediated damage was greatly increased in the mouse small intestine, characterized by increased inflammation and cell death. Moreover, ATG16L1 deficiency slowed the recovery of the intestinal epithelium, and Atg16l1-deficient IECs had an impaired proliferative response. Our study further explored the role of pro-inflammatory signaling in the cell death we had observed in Atg16l1ΔIEC mice during acute enteropathy. We found that IFNγ was driving cell death and overall pathology in Atg16l1ΔIEC mice. In contrast, blocking neither TNF nor type I IFN signaling was able to rescue the phenotype. In addition, cytokine expression and, concomitantly, cell death depended on the presence of the intestinal microbiota. Altogether, the work outlined in this thesis demonstrates a role for autophagy in protecting the intestinal epithelium from T cell-mediated damage and cytokine-induced cell death. This sheds further light on how the CD-associated ATG16L1 risk allele contributes to the disruption of intestinal homeostasis and development of pathological intestinal lesions.
Advances in Scalable Bayesian Inference: Gaussian Processes & Discrete Variable Models
Keywords: Gaussian process
Kronecker product
Variational inference

Gaussian processes (GPs) are exactly the models we would like to use for modern machine learning tasks; they are non-parametric models whose capacity naturally adapts to the quantity of training data, are highly interpretable, offer powerful opportunities to incorporate prior knowledge, and they deal with uncertainty due to lack of data in a rigorous manner through Bayesian inference. Unfortunately, the generic algorithm for GP training and inference scales with O(n^3) time and O(n^2) storage on a problem with n training observations. Given present-day computational resources, this scaling makes GPs struggle to scale beyond modestly sized datasets. This thesis explores approaches to scale Gaussian process training and inference to large datasets without sacrificing the benefits of these models. Specifically, we present theoretical analyses alongside algorithmic advances in GP modelling and inference for regression and classification problems. First, we consider GP inference on a problem structure present in many spatiotemporal problems and develop several algorithms that dramatically reduce the complexity of exact GP inference using Kronecker matrix algebra. We then discuss a novel GP approximation by showing how a highly accurate Nyström approximation of kernel eigenfunction can use as many as 10^33 inducing points with little computational expense. We subsequently consider a highly general class of GP covariance kernels and show that the GP marginal likelihood can be computed with a complexity that is independent of the number of training observations and as low as linear in the number of kernel basis functions. We then consider a variational inference approximation to the GP posterior that exploits a stochastic training strategy whose per iteration complexity is independent of both the number of training examples and the number of kernel basis functions. We show that this unique approach enables the use of high-capacity GP models on large datasets for regression and classification. Finally, we consider a discrete relaxation of continuous priors that enables fast inferencing on devices with limited computing resources. We develop a novel variational inference procedure that exploits Kronecker matrix algebra to compute the variational bound exactly and with a complexity that is independent of the dataset size.
Three Studies of the Interaction between Forest Quality and Forest Sector Development
Keywords: data science
economic development
economics
forest industry
forestry
geospatial

Forests are central to current policy discussions around anthropogenic climate change and rapid biodiversity loss. However, forest sector development is mostly absent from research and policy agendas that focus heavily on land cover change. This is regrettable: industrial forest sectors impact ecosystems over vast areas, provide an important regional (and sometimes national) driver of economic growth, and range in approach from sustainable management to resource mining. Understanding the development of national forest products sectors is therefore a worthwhile goal, especially in countries that still retain high forest cover, and it is this effort (write large) at which this thesis is aimed. The first paper proposes a new approach to studying economically exploited forests using satellite data, arguing that easy-to-obtain attributes (location, productivity) allow exploited forests to be disaggregated by economic type. The paper produces a global classification and mapping, and shows that distinguishing the ‘quality’ of harvested forests in this way aids knowledge discovery about the sources of comparative advantage in international trade. The second paper then uses this global mapping, with minor refinements, to study the importance of materials (i.e., forest) quality within a production function framework. This effort is complicated by the existence of several fundamental and unresolved critiques of aggregate production theory, with which the paper is primarily concerned. Following a demonstration of the importance of these critiques, the second paper addresses their interrelation by comparing fully physical with economic production functions. Heterogenous panel estimators and data envelopment analysis are used to investigate the importance of aggregation for hypothesis testing in a production function framework. The third paper returns the focus to forest sector development, undertaking an exploratory empirical study of the forms of forest sector development currently in existence, as well as various hypotheses regarding their distribution across countries. Drawing on the use of cross-sectional regressions and pattern recognition in growth economics, the paper constructs a typology of forest sector outcomes, and establishes an empirical link between historical path dependence and development outcomes by constructing a dataset of start dates of higher education in forestry.
Unequal Spaces: Suburbs, Apartments, and Bicycles in a Global City
Keywords: active transport
cycling
housing type
social practice theory
suburban form
transportation equity

Planners promote utilitarian cycling and urban intensification to increase the health and sustainability of urban populations. North American planners and researchers focus on cycling supports in urban cores. There is little research on suburban cycling and virtually none on the relationship between cycling and housing type even though the relationship between cycling and population density is unclear. Yet, in the City of Toronto most people live in suburban neighbourhoods (68%) and 55% of Toronto’s population also lives in apartment style housing. Sixty percent of trips <5km, a distance easily cycled in 20 minutes, originate in Toronto’s inner-ring suburbs. To effectively combat the ills of automobiles, residents in suburban areas and apartment housing must be considered. My research addresses knowledge gaps related to these seemingly unrelated areas. My thinking is based in social practice theory. A scoping review of social practice theory and urban transport revealed how a new theoretical approach provides fresh strategies for change. Then, using data from an original survey of residents (n=215), principal component analysis and generalized structural equation modeling were used to develop a model of factors influencing utilitarian cycling by residents of a lower-income auto-oriented suburb. Results suggest, recreational cycling, access to bicycles, group rides, repairs, and ways to meet people who bike may be useful interventions in suburban communities. Finally, using trip data (n=223,232) from the Transportation Tomorrow Survey and controlling for 25 variables, multinomial logistic regression was used to examine the relationship between density, dwelling type and utilitarian cycling. In Toronto, dwelling type is almost as important as gender in determining who cycles. A trip originating from an apartment-based household was less than half as likely to be taken by bicycle as a similar trip originating in a house-based household in 2011 after controlling for all known variables of influence. This work points to new ways to increase sustainable travel in suburban areas and maximize its use in dense urban areas, both of which are necessary to mitigate climate change and build equitable access to healthy transportation options.
Welcome Back a Yard: Jamaican Imaginings of the Diasporan Homebuyer
Keywords: commodification
diaspora
Jamaica
markets
real estate

This study is a transnational ethnography of Jamaica’s diasporic real estate market. Synthesizing performative and institutional frameworks from economic sociology, I intervene in extant debates on diaspora and development over the nature of markets and their influence on diasporan attachments to nation. Rather than problematizing how an abstract market rationality influences diasporans’ incorporation into the nation, an economic sociology approach problematizes the role of diaspora engagement projects in constructing and transforming markets which incorporate the diaspora. Entering this problematic, this study asks: How do real estate professionals imagine the diasporan homebuyer, and what role does that imagination play in the conception of control of Jamaica’s housing market? What sales tactics and approaches do real estate professionals use to sell gated community homes to diasporans? How is the imagined diasporan homebuyer reflected and/or produced through those practices? How do they objectify both the product and the customer they are meant to attract? I argue the diasporan homebuyer is imagined according to three key tropes from Jamaican public discourse: diasporans are affluent relative to Jamaicans, nostalgic for a Jamaica they left but estranged from the Jamaica to which they wish to return. The affluent, nostalgic but estranged diasporan is understood as a solution to an historical problem in Jamaica’s housing industry: a market whose successive conceptions of control have cornered firms into building and selling homes unaffordable to most Jamaicans. These tropes form a schema of value for the gated community home and their intended customers. Sales practices informed by that schema objectify gated community homes through qualities of value, trust and security as concerns calculated to appeal to affluent, nostalgic and especially estranged homebuyers. At the same time, the diasporan homebuyer is objectified through a sales approach intended to exploit (or produce) the tension between nostalgia and estrangement. Real estate professionals value affluent, nostalgic and estranged diasporans as customers to whom they can commodify their own reputations and knowledge of Jamaica. As such, sales practices are designed to “sift” the heterogeneity of the real diaspora to find and/or perform the idealized diasporan homebuyer of professionals’ imaginations.