Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Award: Modeling Precolonial and Colonial Niche Construction

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2).

This project will undertake research to better understand how and why humans modify their natural environments, and what happens when they stop doing so. Humans have had far-reaching effects on the environment across the planet, so it is important to research the specific demographic and economic drivers of these impacts. Archaeology can provide a useful means to address these issues, as the past is full of case studies which can be analyzed to understand such activities and trace the history of environmental impacts.

Such research can also inform solutions to environmental degradation and contribute to understanding the environmental impacts of human population changes and how different economic systems can lead to either ecological destruction or long-term health.

This project consists of both computational modeling and archaeological data analysis to better understand human environmental impacts. The modeling will contribute to theory about environmental modification by building computer simulations to investigate the impacts of human population size and economic forces on the environment. The analysis will evaluate environmental data from a time of colonial settlement and integration into a new global economy.

This analysis will test the predictions of the model and attempt to determine the ecological impacts of colonization and how the environment was impacted by resulting changes in forest management, farming, and hunting. The results of this research will contribute to knowledge of environmental modification and natural resource management, both in theory and in terms of the history of environmental changes that have led us to the present.

This information can help researchers to better understand how to improve the ecology of our planet today.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.