Abstract
Objectives: Infant underrepresentation poses a great risk to accurate palaeodemographic findings when analysing skeletal samples. Empirically derived palaeodemographic methods all require unbiased or minimally biased pre-adult representation for estimating demographic characteristics, including fertility. Currently, there are no reliable methods for estimating palaeodemographic parameters when pre-adults are underrepresented in skeletal samples, consequently such samples are often excluded from palaeodemographic analyses. The aim of this paper is to develop a method for estimating total fertility rate (TFR) using reproductive aged adults, specifically for samples with suspected pre-adult under-enumeration.
Methodology: United Nations mortality data and TFR from the World Population Prospects was utilised. The correlation between known fertility and the proportion of individuals in key reproductive years (15-49 years) to total adult sample (15+ years) was assessed as an indirect means to estimate fertility.
Results: It was determined that the proportion of reproductive aged adults is a reasonable proxy for fertility. A significant positive correlation was observed between the TFR and those who died aged 15-49 years of age as a proportion of those who died ≥15 years (D15-49/D15+). Standard error of the estimate revealed reasonable predictive accuracy. When applied to two modern non-agricultural populations, the method showed some variability in accuracy but good potential for an improved outcome over existing methods when pre-adults are underrepresented.
Conclusion: This research has provided a new method for estimating fertility in archaeological skeletal samples with pre-adult under-enumeration. In combination with a contextually focussed approach, this provides a significant step towards further use of biased samples in palaeodemography
Methodology: United Nations mortality data and TFR from the World Population Prospects was utilised. The correlation between known fertility and the proportion of individuals in key reproductive years (15-49 years) to total adult sample (15+ years) was assessed as an indirect means to estimate fertility.
Results: It was determined that the proportion of reproductive aged adults is a reasonable proxy for fertility. A significant positive correlation was observed between the TFR and those who died aged 15-49 years of age as a proportion of those who died ≥15 years (D15-49/D15+). Standard error of the estimate revealed reasonable predictive accuracy. When applied to two modern non-agricultural populations, the method showed some variability in accuracy but good potential for an improved outcome over existing methods when pre-adults are underrepresented.
Conclusion: This research has provided a new method for estimating fertility in archaeological skeletal samples with pre-adult under-enumeration. In combination with a contextually focussed approach, this provides a significant step towards further use of biased samples in palaeodemography
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Journal | American Journal of Biological Anthropology |
| Publication status | Accepted/In press - 14 Mar 2023 |
Keywords
- Palaeodemography
- Bias
- Infant under-enumeration
- Fertility
- Uniformitarianism