Hominin forager technology, food sharing, and diet breadth

Area of Science:

• Paleoanthropology
• Archaeology
• Evolutionary Ecology

Background:

• Palaeolithic diet breadth and composition changed over time.
• Understanding these dietary shifts provides insight into hominin adaptation and behavior.

Purpose of the Study:

• To model diachronic (across time) changes in Palaeolithic diet breadth.
• To investigate the factors influencing the shift towards consuming more hares and birds.

Main Methods:

• Development of a predator-prey model.
• Analysis of foraging effort allocation and efficiency for different prey types (hares/birds vs. tortoises).
• Exploration of technological advancements and their impact on foraging.

Main Results:

• A significant increase in the proportion of hares and birds, and a decrease in tortoises, from the Middle to Upper Palaeolithic in the Levant.
• Dietary shifts are sensitive to foraging efficiencies, suggesting technological improvements.
• A positive correlation between hare/bird consumption and forager population size was observed under varying foraging efficiencies.

Conclusions:

• Evolutionary adjustments in foraging effort allocation, influenced by technological upgrades, explain dietary changes.
• Overexploitation and food sharing can affect diet breadth and population dynamics.
• Incorporating sexual selection may resolve issues related to the 'public goods problem' in foraging models.