Collaborative Research: Long Term Ecosystem Adaptation

This project investigates changes in prehistoric human foraging, mobility patterns, and population dynamics in response to environmental change during the later Pleistocene. The research provides broader context to occupations in a coastal region by comparing the results of new archaeological data analyses to detailed models of the paleo-environment and human foraging patterns on the landscape. This project represents a further step towards understanding how foraging human populations use entire landscapes to extract resources and leave material traces of their behavior, even if only small portions of that material culture are ever recovered through excavation. Agent-based computer simulation modeling bridges the conceptual gap between a robust understanding of foraging decisions, from optimal foraging theory and human behavioral ecology, to the long-term accumulation of stone, plant, and animal remains in the archaeological record. Through a collaboration a multi-institutional collaboration the project expands a partnership with an institution that services mostly students from previously disadvantaged groups. Researchers plan to recruit students to join field teams to work at an archaeological site and to work as research assistants to learn faunal analysis of excavated assemblages. The project will also improve public engagement with science by helping to design an exhibit at a world cultural heritage site. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.