A Model-Based Analysis of the Minimum Size of Demographically-Viable Hunter-Gatherer Populations
Authored by Andrew White
Date Published: 2017
DOI: 10.18564/jasss.3393
Sponsors:
No sponsors listed
Platforms:
Repast
Model Documentation:
Other Narrative
Model Code URLs:
https://www.comses.net/codebases/5300/releases/1.0.0/
Abstract
A non-spatial agent-based model is used to explore how marriage
behaviors and fertility affect the minimum population size required for
hunter-gatherer systems to be demographically viable. The model
incorporates representations of person-and household-level constraints
and behaviors affecting marriage, reproduction, and mortality. Results
suggest that, under a variety of circumstances, a stable population size
of about 1 5 0 persons is demographically viable in the sense that it is
largely immune from extinction through normal stochastic perturbations
in mortality, fertility, and sex ratio. Less restrictive marriage rules
enhance the viability of small populations by making it possible to
capitalize on a greater proportion of the finite female reproductive
span and compensate for random fluctuations in the balance of males and
females.
Tags
Evolution
Demography
hunter-gatherer
Mortality
fertility
systems
Organization
Societies
Polygyny
America
Demographic viability