Allison Young, doctoral candidate pursuing a dual degree in Integrative Biology and Ecology, Evolutionary Biology, and Behavior, in the College of Natural Science, had an initial goal of becoming a wildlife veterinarian. It wasn’t until her junior year of college, when she got her first research experience, that she decided to pursue a career in research instead.
“Through my varied research experiences, I have come to enjoy the challenges that research affords, as well as engaging with thought-provoking questions and collaborating with diverse colleagues,” Young said. “In addition to being personally fulfilling, research provides me with a way of creating networks all over the world to affect change, and to inspire future researchers.”
Her current research focuses on social bee foraging behavior, specifically targeting how individual honey bees make moment-to-moment foraging decisions about when to search for novel resources and when to use a known research, as well as how those decisions relate to species differences in activity and lifespan.
“I have always been interested in animal behavior, and though I initially knew very little about honey bees before entering graduate school, I quickly became enamored with them,” Young said. “Honey bees have an extensive behavioral repertoire, making them an excellent model system for behavioral research. Honey bee foraging behavior fascinates me because bees exhibit amazing flexibility in response to environmental changes, and because they forage for their hive, not just for themselves. How they balance competing individual and colony level interests in a constantly changing world is a puzzling question that I am interested in exploring.”
Young said she hopes her research will provide a greater understanding of the factors shaping the foraging decisions of honey bees, the most important pollinators in the world. If so, it has the potential to give us a greater understanding of how adaptive modulation of search behavior plays a role in flower visitation and pollen dispersal. Additionally, she said she hopes her research will provide an innovative perspective on the relationship between behavior and aging by linking species differences in lifespan to individual decision-making, thereby setting the stage for a comprehensive study of evolutionary and developmental correlates of the aging process.
“Though research is one of my passions, my professional goals also include inspiring future researchers and educating the general public,” Young said. “Through my research, my interest in behavioral flexibility will converge with my desire to be involved in a project with opportunities for education and outreach. My hope is that my findings will inspire interest in protecting bees, as well as provide insights into how natural selection has tuned the trade-off between foraging behavior and mortality on both the species and the individual level. In the future, I plan to continue conducting research with broad societal impacts as a professor, so I can further inspire others to pursue a career in research and facilitate collaboration.”
The National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship award consists of a three-year annual stipend of $34,000, along with a $12,000 cost of education allowance for tuition and fees. Young said this money will specifically fund her upcoming field work in India, where she will be studying the foraging behavior of three Asian honey be species.
“It is a great honor to receive this award,” Young said. “It is one of the most prestigious fellowships a graduate student can receive, so I was thrilled to get it. I am excited about the many opportunities this award will allow me to pursue as I begin my research career.”
