Factors affecting provisioning and foraging in rapidly changing landscapes

觅食决定影响营养、社会关系和种群间的相遇。人类和动物可能因共享资源而发生冲突，从而影响到双方的生存。尽管有大量的研究表明是什么导致了特定的觅食决定，但人们对最近的、快速的、剧烈的景观变化是如何影响个体选择吃什么和在哪里吃的知之甚少。在这种情况下，个体差异与供应中的文化差异相互作用，影响特定觅食决策的成本和收益。为了了解这些复杂的动态，本项目使用生物文化人类学的理论模型来研究在快速变化的社会和生态景观中影响觅食和供应决策的因素。该项目支持两个少数民族服务机构的早期职业研究人员、多机构合作和学生培训。它向学术和非学术受众广泛传播研究成果，并开发统计软件和教育课程，以促进知识的产生和传播。研究人员关注的是，在农业集约化正在迅速改变传统景观的背景下，灵长类动物和人类是如何相互作用和相互影响的。具体来说，该项目的目标是：1)确定人类改造的栖息地如何影响猕猴的行为；2)研究人们与猕猴互动的动机；3)开发新的统计方法来检查社会网络和行为。为了实现这些目标，项目团队收集了猕猴社会和范围行为、人类猕猴互动和森林食物供应数据的纵向数据，并进行了人种学访谈。这项研究可以促进对集体决策的认识和理解，灵长类动物如何适应不断扩大的人为压力，以及驱动人类与野生动物相互作用的因素。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Foraging decisions affect nutrition, social relationships, and between-population encounters. Humans and animals may come into conflict over shared resources, affecting subsistence in both cases. Despite significant research on what leads to specific foraging decisions, little is known about how recent, rapid, dramatic changes in landscape affect what an individual chooses to eat and where. Individual differences interact with cultural variation in provisioning to affect the costs and benefits of specific foraging decisions in such contexts. To understand these complex dynamics, this project uses theoretical models from biocultural anthropology to investigate the factors affecting decisions to forage and provision in a rapidly changing social and ecological landscape. The project supports early-career researchers based at two minority-serving institutions, multi-institution collaborations, and student training. It disseminates research broadly to academic and non-academic audiences and develops statistical software and educational curricula to facilitate knowledge generation and spread. The researchers focus on how primates and people interact and mutually impact one another’s behavior in contexts where agricultural intensification is rapidly modifying traditional landscapes. Specifically, the project goals are to: 1) determine how human-modified habitats shape macaque behavior; 2) examine people’s motivations to engage in interactions with macaques; and 3) develop novel statistical methods to examine social networks and behavior. To accomplish these objectives, the project team collects longitudinal data on macaque social and ranging behavior, human-macaque interactions, and forest food availability data, and conducts ethnographic interviews. This research can advance knowledge and understanding of collective decision making, how primates adapt to expanding anthropogenic pressures, and the factors driving human-wildlife interactions.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.