MANCHESTER — A Southern New Hampshire University senior who will accompany one of her professors to Africa to study the interaction between tourists and gorillas says she was more nervous about the shots needed for international travel than she was about living in the wild in Uganda.

Heidi Quigley, a communications major, will help associate professor Michele Goldsmith with research into the effects of repeated exposure of gorillas to tourists who spend hefty sums to visit with the primates in their habitat.

Goldsmith is a biological anthropologist who holds the Christos and Mary Papoutsy Distinguished Chair in Ethics and Social Responsibility. Christos Papoutsy was a successful electronics entrepreneur who has lectured and written on entrepreneurship and ethics.

Going to Africa and spending three weeks among gorillas while living in a tent in central Uganda doesn't worry Quigley.

“My family is super-excited, my parents are so supportive of what I do. They're not nervous about it,” Quigley said. “My friends think I'm crazy.”

Goldsmith's research concentrates not only on the impact tourism has on the gorillas, but also on how close encounters with human's closest relatives in the animal kingdom affects tourists.

Guided gorilla tracking excursions have grown in popularity in the hills of Uganda. Tourists clamor for government permits to spend an hour interacting with gorillas in the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest.

Tha dventures are a major source of tourism revenue for Uganda, leading to more and more groups of gorillas being sought out for contact with more and more humans.

Goldsmith's study concentrates on the impact the contact will have on the long-term ecosystem that supports the gorillas.

“The idea behind the tourism started when gorillas were being butchered, even when they had no value to anybody,” Goldsmith said. “They were just being slaughtered. Their hands were being made into ashtrays.”

The gorilla tourism industry has raised money to protect the animals. Goldsmith's research examines the ecological cost.

Troops of gorillas have been wiped out when exposed to human disease. Gorillas become accustomed to humans as tourists, but the newfound trust can lead to dangerous interaction with humans who are neither curious nor enchanted.

Sometimes the gorillas are so accustomed to humans that they tread onto nearby farms and help themselves to the crops, having no way to realize that the humans who own the farms view them not as curiosities but as pests.

“It puts them under constant pressure,” said Goldsmith. Her research centers on the ethical considerations involved in the forced mixing of man and primate. The gorillas are saved from poachers, but could be exposed to new and more insidious harm as they lose their fear of humans.

“One (human) infectious disease can mean we lose entire populations of 300 individuals in a small, isolated area,” Goldsmith said.

Gorillas are now inoculated against human disease.

As man and gorilla become more accustomed to each other, there is also an impact on the human visitors. Quigley will help in that part of Goldsmith's study.

“My research involves how (tourists') attitudes change before and after their trek into the wild; if they have a different perspective after they leave here,” Quigley said.

Research a couple of years ago found that well-to-do tourists developed a greater appreciation for the impact of humans on ecology after cavorting with gorillas as part of a jungle-visit package tour.

Quigley will survey tourists who visit Bwindi forest. Some will be tracked to see if their newly found perspective survives the return to the comforts of home.

The project will also give the SNHU senior a real-world jump-start on her honors thesis.

Goldsmith has been going to Africa since the 1990s. She took one hiatus after grant funding dried up following the slaughter of eight tourists in the Bwindi forest in 1999. She once vowed not to return after a near-fatal bout with malaria, but returned the next year.

Quigley has no fears about living in a tent in African mountain country for a few weeks in mid-summer. Her mentor has briefed her on what to expect.

“She had told me some horror stories. She lived in central Africa for a couple of years and has seen it all,” Quigley said.

“I have the same concerns about my safety as I would have driving down the street,” Quigley said.

billsmith@unionleader.com