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Carrying Capacity and Dynamic Equilibrium in the Prehistoric Southwest

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Ezra B. W. Zubrow
Ezra B. W. Zubrow*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Arizona
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Abstract

A model of carrying capacity as a dynamic equilibrium system is generated and made operational in order to test a series of hypotheses relating population and settlement patterns. The development of populations in marginal resource zones is shown to be a function of optimal zone exploitation in the Hay Hollow Valley. MacArthur's deviation amplifying model is presented as an alternative to the model's diminishing resource curves as a possible explanation of the extinction of Hay Hollow population by A.D. 1400. Finally, the effects of population excess disequilibriums as defined by the model are examined in relationship to the settlement pattern variables of population aggregation, spatial aggregation and residential area.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 36 , Issue 2 , April 1971 , pp. 127 - 138
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1971

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