Schuyler, Q. A., Wilcox, C., Townsend, K. A., Wedemeyer-Strombel, K. R., Balazs, G., van Sebille, E. and Hardesty, B. D. (2016), Risk analysis reveals global hotspots for marine debris ingestion by sea turtles. Glob Change Biol, 22: 567–576. doi:10.1111/gcb.13078
“Risk analysis reveals global hotspots for marine debris ingestion by sea turtles,” is a scholarly article written by Qamar A. Schuyler, Chris Wilcox, Kathy A. Townsend, Kathryn R. Wedemeyer-Strombel, George Balazs, Erik van Sebille, Britta Denise Hardesty. This article was first published on September 14, 2015. The article is about the how plastic marine debris is harming the oceanic environment and the creatures that dwell there. They wanted to analysis the risk of plastic ingestion of sea turtles on a global scale, and this is what they focused their research on. The type of data they used was acts, behavior, and events of the plastic currents and turtle migration. They also had to get reports of acts and events of turtle biopsies with plastic debris inside of them. The data they got global marine plastic distributions based on ocean drifter data with sea turtle maps. They then were able to predict the turtles’ exposure to the plastic pollution. The methods of gathering data that they used were public records, detached observation, and content analysis. They also provided caveats, data gaps, and risk analysis about their data. They calculated that there are certain sea turtles that are more susceptible, and the locations that have higher trash accumulation. They concluded that roughly 52% of sea turtles may have ingested debris. I believe that their research is valid. They got their data from numerous credible sources, and they accounted for error in great detail to make sure the data they were collecting was correct. The amount of plastic that is ingested by marine animals is too large, and it is human caused. Humans need to become more sustainable.