Hunter-gatherer mobility and technological landscapes in southernmost South America : a statistical learning approach
Briz i Godino, Ivan (University of York. Department of Archaeology)
Ahedo, Virginia (Universidad de Burgos. Departamento de Ingeniería Civil)
Álvarez, Myrian (CONICET-Centro Austral de Investigaciones Científicas)
Pal, Nélida (CONICET-Centro Austral de Investigaciones Científicas)
Turnes, Lucas (CONICET-Centro Austral de Investigaciones Científicas)
Santos, José Ignacio (Universidad de Burgos. Departamento de Ingeniería Civil)
Zurro Hernández, Débora (Universitat Pompeu Fabra. Departament d'Humanitats)
Caro Saiz, Jorge (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament de Sociologia)
Galán, José Manuel (Universidad de Burgos. Departamento de Ingeniería Civil)

Date:	2018
Abstract:	The present work aims to quantitatively explore and understand the relationship between mobility types (nautical versus pedestrian), specific technological traits and shared technological knowledge in pedestrian hunter-gatherer and nautical hunter-fisher-gatherer societies from the southernmost portion of South America. To that end, advanced statistical learning techniques are used: state-of-the-art classification algorithms and variable importance analyses. Results show a strong relationship between technological knowledge, traits and mobility types. Occupations can be accurately classified into nautical and pedestrian due to the existence of a non-trivial pattern between mobility and a relatively small fraction of variables from some specific technological categories. Cases where the best-fitted classification algorithm fails to generalize are found significantly interesting. These instances can unveil lack of information, not enough entries in the training set, singular features or ambiguity, the latter case being a possible indicator of the interaction between nautical and pedestrian societies.
Grants:	Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación CSD2010-00034 Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación CULM-HAR2016-77672-P Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación HAR-2009-06996 Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación HAR2017-90883-REDC European Commission PROC/12-120610-A
Note:	Altres ajuts: Wenner-Gren Foundation (GR-7846); Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (PIP-0348), (PIP-0706); Agencia Nacional de Promoción Científica y Tecnológica (PICT-2012-2148)
Rights:	Aquest document està subjecte a una llicència d'ús Creative Commons. Es permet la reproducció total o parcial, la distribució, la comunicació pública de l'obra i la creació d'obres derivades, fins i tot amb finalitats comercials, sempre i quan es reconegui l'autoria de l'obra original.
Language:	Anglès
Document:	Article ; recerca ; Versió publicada
Subject:	Hunter-gatherer ; Statistical learning ; Shared technology ; Random forest ; Mobility
Published in:	Royal Society Open Science, Vol. 5 (october 2018) , ISSN 2054-5703

DOI: 10.1098/rsos.180906
PMID: 30473837

14 p, 1.4 MB

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