Using ABM to Evaluate the Impact of Topography and Climate Change on Social Networks

Summary

Anthropological research suggests that climate and environmental resources influence the lifestyle of hunter-gatherers. My research uses an agent-based model to generate test expectations related to the impact of different geographical and social environments on the social networks formed therein. It focuses on Magdalenian social networks created in the Cantabrian and Dordogne region, and visible through similarities of portable art representations. The regional resources and climate of the period are recreated through ecological models and downscaled paleoclimatic data, respectively. The model also uses realistic DEMs and a human-informed version of least-cost path to reproduce possible traveling routes between fake archaeological sites. The expectations generated are tested through a stylistic study of Magdalenian portable art objects. This presentation will demonstrate the potential of combining computer models with empirical data to increase our understanding of prehistoric social dynamics.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Modeling People, Places, and Things: Revisiting Archaeology as Model-Based Science   •
• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 16086