This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: Societal changes do not follow a linear path—this also holds true for Neolithic Europe, approximately 8,000 to 4,000 years ago. Two researchers from the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (NASU) and the Leibniz-Zentrum für Archäologie (LEIZA) in Germany have looked at factors driving these dynamics.
Using a mathematical model, they analyzed the interplay between population size, production capacity and information exchange. Recurring phases of increasing and decreasing complexity are known as social cycles. But what triggers these cycles?
And how can they be identified through archaeological evidence? These questions are at the core of a study conducted by Dr. Aleksandr Diachenko, senior researcher at the Institute of Archaeology of the Ukrainian NAS, and Dr.
Detlef Gronenborn, deputy head of the Prehistory Department at LEIZA and an adjunct professor at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany. Their study, titled "Social dynamics signals in archaeological time-series: How cultural transmission and production biases shape assemblage diversity," delves into these questions. The findings demonstrate that time series of pottery styles can yield valuable insights into social dynamics.
The research is published in the journal PLOS One. For their investigation, the researchers focused on pottery—a material usually preserved in large quantities and over extended periods. Variations in shape and decoration within these data sets can provide clues about changes within the societies that produced them.
The researchers tested their algorithm on thousands of pottery shards from Germany and Ukraine. "We developed a mathematical model to describe how the organization and intensity of pottery production can influence the number of decoration styles. Additionally, the model reveals how pottery styles evolve through human information exchange and population growth," explains Diachenko.
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