The Bioarchaeology of Migration in the Ancient Mediterranean

2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 211-241
Author(s):  
Thomas P. Leppard ◽  
Carmen Esposito ◽  
Massimiliano Esposito
Keyword(s):  
Behavioral Change ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Human Mobility ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Human Movement ◽  
Cultural Effects ◽  
The Mean ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
Late Roman Period ◽  
And Migration

The Mediterranean is often regarded as characterized by high levels of human mobility and migration, which are in turn considered to have driven large-scale cultural effects. However, this supposition is problematic, in that it relies on various types of proxy for human movement, rather than on direct bioarchaeological evidence. Accordingly, in this study we attempt to quantify diachronic Mediterranean mobility and migration by undertaking the first meta-analysis of the burgeoning radiogenic isotope datasets now available from the Mediterranean. We gathered 87Sr/ 86Sr data derived from funerary populations from the Neolithic to the late Roman period. We imposed a data-hygiene regime, discarding low-quality, methodologically idiosyncratic, or other potentially erroneous data; this resulted in a cleansed and trimmed dataset (n = 899). Within this dataset, we find that mean rates of post-juvenile migration are relatively low. Utilizing the methodologies specific to individual studies, the mean nonlocal rate is 9.57%. Imposing a standard methodology on the most statistically robust data (resulting in n = 702) allows us to recompute a mean nonlocal rate of 5.84%. In both the data as originally reported and as recomputed, we detect comparatively higher levels of migration in the period 7000–3500 BC, followed by decreasing levels of migration in the later Holocene. We discuss the implications of these results for how we understand longterm cultural and behavioral change in the Mediterranean.

scholarly journals A meta-analysis of the literature on climate change and migration

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-52
Author(s):  
Michel Beine ◽  
Lionel Jeusette
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climatic Factors ◽  
Human Mobility ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Displacement Effect ◽  
Methodological Choices ◽  
Econometric Methods ◽  
And Migration

Abstract Recent surveys of the literature on climate change and migration emphasize the important diversity of outcomes and approaches of the empirical studies. In this paper, we conduct a meta-analysis in order to investigate the role of the methodological choices of these empirical studies in finding some particular results concerning the role of climatic factors as drivers of human mobility. We code 51 papers representative of the literature in terms of methodological approaches. This results in the coding of more than 85 variables capturing the methodology of the main dimensions of the analysis at the regression level. These dimensions include authors' reputation, type of mobility, measures of mobility, type of data, context of the study, econometric methods, and last but not least measures of the climatic factors. We look at the influence of these characteristics on the probability of finding any effect of climate change, a displacement effect, an increase in immobility, and evidence in favor of a direct vs. an indirect effect. Our results highlight the role of some important methodological choices, such as the frequency of the data on mobility, the level of development, the measures of human mobility and of the climatic factors as well as the econometric methodology.

What does the Ultimatum Game mean in the real world?

2005 ◽  
Vol 28 (6) ◽  
pp. 824-825 ◽  
Author(s):  
Randolph C. Grace ◽  
Simon Kemp
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Differences ◽  
Predictive Validity ◽  
Real World ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Ultimatum Game ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Social Expenditure ◽  
Cross Cultural Differences ◽  
The Mean

The predictive validity of the ultimatum game (UG) for cross-cultural differences in real-world behavior has not yet been established. We discuss results of a recent meta-analysis (Oosterbeek et al 2004), which examined UG behavior across large-scale societies and found that the mean percent offers rejected was positively correlated with social expenditure.

Convergent lines of evidence support NOTCH4 as a schizophrenia risk gene

2020 ◽  
pp. jmedgenet-2020-106830
Author(s):  
Yan Zhang ◽  
Shiwu Li ◽  
Xiaoyan Li ◽  
Yongfeng Yang ◽  
Wenqiang Li ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Human Brain ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Eqtl Analysis ◽  
Risk Gene ◽  
And Migration ◽  
Eqtl Data ◽  
Lines Of Evidence ◽  
Brain Tissues

The association between NOTCH4 and schizophrenia has been repeatedly reported. However, the results from different genetic studies are inconsistent, and the role of NOTCH4 in schizophrenia pathogenesis remains unknown. Here, we provide convergent lines of evidence that support NOTCH4 as a schizophrenia risk gene. We first performed a meta-analysis and found that a genetic variant (rs2071287) in NOTCH4 was significantly associated with schizophrenia (a total of 125 848 subjects, p=8.31×10−17), with the same risk allele across all tested samples. Expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL) analysis showed that rs2071287 was significantly associated with NOTCH4 expression (p=1.08×10−14) in human brain tissues, suggesting that rs2071287 may confer schizophrenia risk through regulating NOTCH4 expression. Sherlock integrative analysis using a large-scale schizophrenia GWAS and eQTL data from human brain tissues further revealed that NOTCH4 was significantly associated with schizophrenia (p=4.03×10−7 in CMC dataset and p=3.06×10−6 in xQTL dataset), implying that genetic variants confer schizophrenia risk through modulating NOTCH4 expression. Consistently, we found that NOTCH4 was significantly downregulated in brains of schizophrenia patients compared with controls (p=2.53×10−3), further suggesting that dysregulation of NOTCH4 may have a role in schizophrenia. Finally, we showed that NOTCH4 regulates proliferation, self-renewal, differentiation and migration of neural stem cells, suggesting that NOTCH4 may confer schizophrenia risk through affecting neurodevelopment. Our study provides convergent lines of evidence that support the involvement of NOTCH4 in schizophrenia. In addition, our study also elucidates a possible mechanism for the role of NOTCH4 in schizophrenia pathogenesis.

scholarly journals Human Movement Responses to the Rorschach and Mirroring Activity: An fMRI Study

Assessment ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luciano Giromini ◽  
Donald J. Viglione ◽  
Jaime A. Pineda ◽  
Piero Porcelli ◽  
David Hubbard ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Mirror Neuron System ◽  
Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Mirror Neuron ◽  
Region Of Interest ◽  
Human Movement ◽  
Brain Areas ◽  
Embodied Simulation ◽  
Fmri Study

It has been suggested that the Rorschach human movement (M) response could be associated with an embodied simulation mechanism mediated by the mirror neuron system (MNS). To date, evidence for this hypothesis comes from two electroencephalogram studies and one repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation study. To provide additional data on this topic, the Rorschach was administered during fMRI to a sample of 26 healthy adult volunteers. Activity in MNS-related brain areas temporally associated with M responses was compared with such activity for other, non-M Rorschach responses. Data analyses focused on MNS regions of interest identified by Neurosynth, a web-based platform for large scale, automated meta-analysis of fMRI data. Consistent with the hypothesis that M responses involve embodied simulation and MNS activity, univariate region of interest analyses showed that production of M responses associated with significantly greater activity in MNS-related brain areas when compared with non-M Rorschach responses. This finding is consistent with the traditional interpretation of the M code.

scholarly journals Assessment of sagittal spinopelvic alignment in asymptomatic Chinese juveniles and adolescents: a large cohort study and comparative meta-analysis

2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Canglong Hou ◽  
Kai Chen ◽  
Yu Chen ◽  
Tianjunke Zhou ◽  
Mingyuan Yang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cohort Study ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Mean Value ◽  
Large Cohort ◽  
Mean Values ◽  
Spinopelvic Alignment ◽  
Large Cohort Study ◽  
Sagittal Parameters ◽  
The Mean

Abstract Study design Retrospective study and comparative meta-analysis. Objective To document the sagittal spinopelvic alignment in a large cohort study in asymptomatic Chinese juveniles and adolescents, and to explore whether these parameters were different from various regions using meta-analysis. Methods Medical records of 656 asymptomatic Chinese juveniles and adolescents were reviewed, whose mean age was 13.14 ± 3.41 years old, including 254 male and 402 female volunteers. Demographic and lateral radiological parameters were evaluated. Furthermore, a systematic online search was performed to identify eligible studies. Weight mean difference (WMD) with 95% confidence interval (CI) were used to evaluate whether these sagittal parameters were different from various regions. Results The mean value of sagittal spinopelvic alignment in this study was calculated and analyzed respectively. Significant differences of PI (34.20 ± 4.00 vs. 43.18 ± 7.12, P < 0.001) and PT (3.99 ± 6.04 vs. 8.42 ± 7.08, P < 0.001) were found between juveniles and adolescents. A total of 17 studies were recruited for meta-analysis. For juvenile populations, TK, PI and SS of Caucasians were significantly larger than those of our study (all P < 0.001). As for adolescent populations, PI (P = 0.017), TK (P = 0.017) and SS (P < 0.001) of Caucasians was found to be greater when compared with that of our study. All in all, TK, PI and SS in Chinese pre-adult populations were significantly smaller than those populations in Caucasian regions (all P < 0.001). Conclusion Our study was the first large-scale study that reported the mean values of sagittal parameters in asymptomatic Chinese juveniles and adolescents. There were significant differences in TK, PI and SS between our study and other previous reported populations, which reminded us for using specific mean values in different populations when restoring a relatively normal sagittal spinopelvic balance in spinal deformity.

scholarly journals Emergence of Urban Growth Patterns from Human Movements

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fengli Xu ◽  
Yong Li ◽  
Chaoming Song
Keyword(s):  
Urban Growth ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Scaling Laws ◽  
Human Mobility ◽  
Human Movement ◽  
Urban Morphology ◽  
Growth Patterns ◽  
Spatial Correlations ◽  
Movement Model ◽  
Human Movements

Abstract Cities grow in a bottom-up manner, leading to fractal-like urban morphology characterized by scaling laws. Correlated percolation has succeeded in modeling urban geometries by imposing strong spatial correlations. However, the origin of such correlations remains largely unknown. Very recently, our understanding of human movements has been revolutionized thanks to the increasing availability of large-scale human mobility data. This paper proposes a novel human movement model that offers a micro-foundation for the dynamics of urban growth. We compare the proposed model with three empirical datasets, which evidences that strong social couplings and long-memory effects are two fundamental principles responsible for the mystical spatial correlations. The model accounts for the empirically observed scaling laws, but also allows us to understand the city evolution dynamically.

scholarly journals Modelling cholera epidemics: the role of waterways, human mobility and sanitation

2011 ◽  
Vol 9 (67) ◽  
pp. 376-388 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. Mari ◽  
E. Bertuzzo ◽  
L. Righetto ◽  
R. Casagrandi ◽  
M. Gatto ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Long Range ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Human Mobility ◽  
Human Movement ◽  
Epidemiological Data ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
Regional Patterns ◽  
Spatially Explicit Model ◽  
Kwazulu Natal

We investigate the role of human mobility as a driver for long-range spreading of cholera infections, which primarily propagate through hydrologically controlled ecological corridors. Our aim is to build a spatially explicit model of a disease epidemic, which is relevant to both social and scientific issues. We present a two-layer network model that accounts for the interplay between epidemiological dynamics, hydrological transport and long-distance dissemination of the pathogen Vibrio cholerae owing to host movement, described here by means of a gravity-model approach. We test our model against epidemiological data recorded during the extensive cholera outbreak occurred in the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa during 2000–2001. We show that long-range human movement is fundamental in quantifying otherwise unexplained inter-catchment transport of V. cholerae , thus playing a key role in the formation of regional patterns of cholera epidemics. We also show quantitatively how heterogeneously distributed drinking water supplies and sanitation conditions may affect large-scale cholera transmission, and analyse the effects of different sanitation policies.

scholarly journals Estimating human mobility in Holocene Western Eurasia with large-scale ancient genomic data

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clemens Schmid ◽  
Stephan Schiffels
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Human Mobility ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Gaussian Process Regression ◽  
Genetic Profile ◽  
Cultural Changes ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
Western Eurasia ◽  
Key Aspects ◽  
Key Events

The recent increase in openly available ancient human DNA samples allows for new, large-scale meta analysis applications. Trans-generational past human mobility is one of the key aspects that ancient genomics can contribute to, since changes in ancestry -- unlike cultural changes seen in the archaeological record -- necessarily reflect movements of people. Here we present a new algorithm to quantify past human mobility from large ancient genomic datasets. The key idea of the method is for each individual to compare a hypothetical genetic "origin" point with its actual burial point in space. This is achieved by first creating an interpolated ancestry field through space and time based on Multidimensional scaling and Gaussian process regression, and then using this field to map the ancient individuals into space according to their genetic profile. We apply this new algorithm to a dataset of 3191 aDNA samples with genome-wide data from Western Eurasia in the last 10,000 years and derive a diachronic measure of mobility for subregions in Western, Central, Southern and Eastern Europe. For regions and periods with sufficient data coverage, our mobility estimates show general concordance with previous results, but also reveal new signals of movements beyond the well-known key events.

scholarly journals Large-scale spatial patterns of small-mammal communities in the Mediterranean region revealed by Barn owl diet

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Riegert ◽  
Jiří Šindelář ◽  
Markéta Zárybnická ◽  
Ivan Horáček
Keyword(s):  
Small Mammal ◽  
Mediterranean Region ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Barn Owl ◽  
Island Area ◽  
Small Mammal Community ◽  
Small Mammal Communities ◽  
The Mean ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
Mammal Communities

AbstractDue to mainly opportunistic hunting behaviour of Barn owl can be its diet composition used for assessing local structure of small-mammal community. We evaluated the structure of small-mammal communities in the Mediterranean region by analysing Barn owl diet using own pellets and literature data (85 localities comprising 182,343 prey individuals). Contrary to widely accepted macroecological theory, we found a latitudinal increase of small-mammal alpha diversity, a less distinct west–east increase and lower diversity on islands. The mean prey weight decreased with increasing latitude, while on islands it decreased with increasing island area. The mean prey weight on islands was further negatively affected by mean land modification by human and positively affected by its range. The diet diversity on islands was not affected either by island area or its distance from the mainland. Its composition largely conformed to the main pattern pronounced over whole the region: an unexpected homogeneity of small-mammal community structure. Despite high beta diversity and large between-sample variation in species composition, Crocidura (+ Suncus etruscus) and murids (Apodemus, Mus, Rattus, in marginal regions partly replaced by gerbillids, Meriones or Microtus) composed more than 90% of owl prey in 92% of samples. Peak abundances of these widespread species are associated with a dynamic mosaic of dense patches of sparse herb vegetation and evergreen sclerophyllous shrublands interspersing areas of human activity, the dominant habitat of the inner Mediterranean and richest food resource for foraging Barn owls. The respective small-mammal species can be looked upon as invasive elements accompanying large scale human colonization of the region since the Neolithic and replacing original island biota. Our study documented that desertification of the Mediterranean played an important role in shaping inverse latitudinal gradient in diversity of small-mammals that contradicts to widely accepted mecroecological theory.

scholarly journals Changes in air quality and human mobility in the USA during the COVID-19 pandemic

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cristina L. Archer ◽  
Guido Cervone ◽  
Maryam Golbazi ◽  
Nicolas Al Fahel ◽  
Carolynne Hultquist
Keyword(s):  
Air Quality ◽  
Power Plants ◽  
Human Mobility ◽  
Human Movement ◽  
Motor Vehicles ◽  
Mobility Index ◽  
The Usa ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Ground Monitoring ◽  
Average Drop

Abstract The first goal of this study is to quantify the magnitude and spatial variability of air quality changes in the USA during the COVID-19 pandemic. We focus on two pollutants that are federally regulated, nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and fine particulate matter (PM2.5). NO2 and PM2.5 are both primary and secondary pollutants, meaning that they can be emitted either directly into the atmosphere or indirectly from chemical reactions of emitted precursors. NO2 is emitted during fuel combustion by all motor vehicles and airplanes. PM2.5 is emitted by airplanes and, among motor vehicles, mostly by diesel vehicles, such as commercial heavy-duty diesel trucks. Both PM2.5 and NO2 are also emitted by fossil-fuel power plants, although PM2.5 almost exclusively by coal power plants. Observed concentrations at all available ground monitoring sites (240 and 480 for NO2 and PM2.5, respectively) were compared between April 2020, the month during which the majority of US states had introduced some measure of social distancing (e.g., business and school closures, shelter-in-place, quarantine), and April of the prior 5 years, 2015–2019, as the baseline. Large, statistically significant decreases in NO2 concentrations were found at more than 65% of the monitoring sites, with an average drop of 2 parts per billion (ppb) when compared to the mean of the previous 5 years. The same patterns are confirmed by satellite-derived NO2 column totals from NASA OMI, which showed an average drop in 2020 by 13% over the entire country when compared to the mean of the previous 5 years. PM2.5 concentrations from the ground monitoring sites, however, were not significantly lower in 2020 than those in the past 5 years and were more likely to be higher than lower in April 2020 when compared with those in the previous 5 years. After correcting for the decreasing multi-annual concentration trends, the net effect of COVID-19 at the ground stations in April 2020 was a reduction in NO2 concentrations by − 1.3ppb and a slight increase in PM2.5 concentrations by + 0.28 μg/m3. The second goal of this study is to explain the different responses of these two pollutants, i.e., NO2 was significantly reduced but PM2.5 was nearly unaffected, during the COVID-19 pandemic. The hypothesis put forward is that the shelter-in-place measures affected people’s driving patterns most dramatically, thus passenger vehicle NO2 emissions were reduced. Commercial vehicles (generally diesel) and electricity demand for all purposes remained relatively unchanged, thus PM2.5 concentrations did not drop significantly. To establish a correlation between the observed NO2 changes and the extent to which people were actually sheltering in place, thus driving less, we used a mobility index, which was produced and made public by Descartes Labs. This mobility index aggregates cell phone usage at the county level to capture changes in human movement over time. We found a strong correlation between the observed decreases in NO2 concentrations and decreases in human mobility, with over 4 ppb decreases in the monthly average where mobility was reduced to near 0 and around 1 ppb decrease where mobility was reduced to 20% of normal or less. By contrast, no discernible pattern was detected between mobility and PM2.5 concentrations changes, suggesting that decreases in personal-vehicle traffic alone may not be effective at reducing PM2.5 pollution.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document