Frequent disturbances enhanced the resilience of past human populations

Nature • Vol/Iss. 629(8013) • Springer • • Published In • Pages: 837-842 •
By Riris, Philip, Silva, Fabio, Crema, Enrico, Palmisano, Alessio, Robinson, Erick, Siegel, Peter E., French, Jennifer C., Kirkeng Jørgensen, Erlend, Maezumi, Shira Yoshi, Solheim, Steinar, Bates, Jennifer, Davies, Benjamin, Oh, Yongie, Ren, Xiaolin

Hypothesis

The number of catastrophes experienced by a society in the past informs the extent to which the society's demography is impacted by catastrophes in the present, and the speed at which the society tends to recover.

Test

Test NameSupportSignificanceCoefficientTail
Bayesian models (various)SupportedNANANA

Variables

Variable NameVariable Type OCM Term(s)
Population resistance (i.e. severity of downturns) DependentBirth Statistics, Mortality, Population
Population resilience (i.e. response to downturns)DependentBirth Statistics, Mortality, Population
Relative pace of societal recovery (i.e. speed of response to downturns)DependentBirth Statistics, Mortality, Population
Number of catastrophes experienced in the pastIndependentDisasters

Related Hypotheses

Main AuthorHypothesis
Riris, PhilipSocieties with a greater proportion of land devoted to farming and livestock herding tend to experience more societal catastrophes (from a demographic perspective) but also recover more quickly than societies where less land is devoted to herding and agriculture.
Gurven, Michael D.Combining more than one of the four demographic scenarios (altered mean vital rates (i.e., fertility and mortality), vital rate stochasticity, vital rate covariance, and periodic catastrophes) increases the likelihood of returning the rate of population growth to ZPG p. 12763.
Gurven, Michael D.Through altering the rate of catastrophes a population experiences, it would be possible to adjust the current rapid growth of contemporary human forager groups to achieve ZPG (zero population growth) p. 12763.
Ember, Carol R.". . . there is a positive association between the number of putative unilineal groups at the highest level of unilineal descent in the society and the total number of persons in the society" (85)
Peregrine, Peter N.There will be an association between greater population stability (resilience) to climate-related disasters in societies that are corporate-oriented rather than exclusionary-oriented.