Year: 2021
Type: review
Abstract: Despite advances in our understanding of the geographic and temporal scope of the Paleolithic record, we know remarkably little about the evolutionary and ecological consequences of changes in human behavior. Recent inquiries suggest that human evolution reflects a long history of interconnections between the behavior of humans and their surrounding ecosystems (e.g., niche construction). Developing expectations to identify such phenomena is remarkably difficult because it requires understanding the multi-generational impacts of changes in behavior. These long-term dynamics require insights into the emergent phenomena that alter selective pressures over longer time periods which are not possible to observe, and are also not intuitive based on observations derived from ethnographic time scales. Generative models show promise for probing these potentially unexpected consequences of human-environment interaction. Changes in the uses of landscapes may have long term implications for the environments that hominins occupied. We explore other potential proxies of behavior and examine how modeling may provide expectations for a variety of phenomena.
DOI: 10.1002/evan.21886
Authors: David R. Braun, John Tyler Faith, Matthew J. Douglass, Benjamin Davies, Mitchel J. Power, Vera Aldeias, Nicholas J. Conard, Russell Cutts, Larisa R. G. DeSantis, Lydie M. Dupont, Irene Esteban, Andrew W. Kandel, Naomi E. Levin, Julie Luyt, John Parkington, Robyn Pickering, Lynne Quick, Judith Sealy, Deano Stynder
Institutions: George Washington University, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Utah, Natural History Museum of Utah, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, Interdisciplinary Center for Archaeology and the Evolution of Human Behaviour, University of Algarve, University of Tübingen, Emory University, Vanderbilt University, University of Bremen, University of the Witwatersrand, Heidelberg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, University of Michigan, University of Cape Town, Nelson Mandela University
Language: English
Subfield: Anthropology
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Life on land
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W3129959157