The Interactive Effects of Risk and Climatic Variation on Food Storage Behavior

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Life Is Risky: Human Behavioral Ecological Approaches to Variable Outcomes " session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Risk, or variation in outcomes, is an inherent part of the human condition and can result in the adoption of complex behavioral patterns that seemingly contradict expectations of human rationality. Thus, complex patterns of behavioral adaptation may require considering how risk constrains or encourages decisions. Here, we build on existing frameworks to create a formal mathematical model of risk by integrating components of behavioral ecology with utility theory allowing for the decomposition risk. Using the formal model, we then derive predictions to explain the diverse food storage strategies undertaken by Formative period (2100–500 BP) agriculturalists on the West Tavaputs Plateau in central Utah, known as the Fremont. We then test these predictions using construction and abandonment sequences derived from 14C AMS dates relative to a paleoenvironmental reconstruction.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• Life Is Risky: Human Behavioral Ecological Approaches to Variable Outcomes

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 32843