College of Arts and Sciences

Faculty & Staff Profiles

Dr. Chism has carried out research on wild primate populations throughout the world including a four-year National Science Foundation Fellowship which supported a long-term study of the behavioral ecology of patas monkeys (Erythrocebus patas) in Kenya. While her research has taken her to Africa, the Caribbean, and South America, she also has studied mother-infant behavior in captive groups of primates and has combined field and laboratory techniques in several zoo-based studies. For the last 10 years she has worked in the Area de Conservatíon Regional Comunal de Tamshiyacu-Tahuayo (ACRCTT) in northeastern Peru. This is an area of high biodiversity which local residents have sought to preserve and manage. Chism and several of her Winthrop graduate and undergraduate students have worked on projects in this area to aid in efforts by local and international conservationists to protect the wildlife including the endangered red uakari monkeys. She is a scientific advisor for the Rainforest Conservation Fund, and she also carries out research locally on urban red fox populations. At present she is taking part in the national effort to identify all living species in the U.S. by helping direct the All-Taxa Biological Inventory being carried out in South Carolina State Parks.

Chism teaches a wide variety of courses in biology and biological anthropology and at the undergraduate and graduate level. Her current teaching assignments include graduate courses in "Theory and Method in Biology" and "Advanced Topics in Ecology/Evolutionary Biology." She also teaches "Primate Biology," "Human Ecology," "Principles of Biology", "Conservation Biology", and (with co-teacher Dr. Bill Rogers) "Field Conservation Biology in the Tropics". She participates in the core commitments by teaching the Human Experience course, and also acts as an adviser to biology students wishing to pursue the Conservation Biology track within the major.