AP Environmental History & Human-Nature Interactions Flashcards
6 cards from real AP practice questions. Tap to flip, then mark Knew It or Still Learning — missed cards come back until you master them.
Read the first 6 AP Environmental History & Human-Nature Interactions flashcards as text
The Columbian Exchange primarily describes the transfer of which categories of goods between the Old and New Worlds after 1492?
Answer: Diseases, plants, animals, and people between the Americas, Europe, Africa, and Asia
The Columbian Exchange transferred crops (maize, potatoes, tomatoes), livestock (horses, cattle), diseases (smallpox), and people across the Atlantic with profound ecological consequences.
Which disease introduced by Europeans devastated Indigenous American populations after 1492, killing an estimated 50–90% in some regions?
Answer: Smallpox
Smallpox, to which Indigenous Americans had no prior immunity, caused catastrophic demographic collapse across the Americas after European contact.
The introduction of the horse to the Americas through the Columbian Exchange most significantly transformed:
Answer: Great Plains Indigenous cultures and their buffalo-hunting practices
Horses revolutionized Plains cultures, enabling mounted buffalo hunting that transformed societies like the Comanche, Sioux, and Cheyenne.
The 'Little Ice Age' (approximately 1300–1850) most likely contributed to which historical development?
Answer: Crop failures, famines, and social instability across Eurasia
The Little Ice Age caused reduced agricultural yields, contributing to famines, the Black Death's spread, and social upheaval across Europe and Asia.
Which AP World History period saw the most dramatic human impact on the natural environment through large-scale deforestation and agriculture?
Answer: Industrial Revolution era
The Industrial Revolution dramatically accelerated deforestation, coal burning, and environmental transformation at a global scale unprecedented in human history.
The demographic collapse of Indigenous Americans after 1492 is sometimes called the 'Great Dying.' Its environmental effect included:
Answer: Massive reforestation as abandoned farmland reverted to forest, possibly cooling global temperatures
Recent research suggests that depopulation allowed 56 million hectares of farmland to reforest, potentially causing a measurable global cooling event.