This paper discusses the relationship between floor area and settlement population.

Using a representative sample of 339 hunter-gatherer societies, researchers examine the relationship between hunter-gatherer use of space, size of population and supply of resources to see if they are similar to other organisms. By combining all factors into a single model, the authors claim to explain 86% of the variation in home range. Hunters have greater resource distribution than gatherers but both more so than aquatic foragers. Lastly, terrestrial foragers have more extensive home ranges than aquatic foragers.

Textor summarizes cross-cultural findings on societies where subsistence is primarily by 'food gathering' which includes hunting, fishing, and gathering.

This article proposes that ground plans may be used as a criterion for determining the relative permanence of settlement patterns in archaelogical societies. Results suggest that impermanent settlements and small community size are significantly associated with circular ground plans and that permanent settlements with larger community sizes are significantly associated with rectangular ground plans.

This article explores the relationships between habitat and social organization among humans and other species. Diet, technology, group size, home range, mobility, kinship, marital residence, sexual division of labor, mating system, central places, food sharing, and egalitarianism are all considered.

In this paper, the authors analyzed data on 20 hunter-gatherer groups in order to understand the factors that influence the diversity and elaborateness of their tool assemblages. They used data collected by a variety of ethnographers to draw inferences about the complexity of implement assemblages and how it is affected by ecological constraints, modes of resource procurement, group movement, and population size. Regression analysis showed that the two strongest predictors of implement complexity were growth season (GS) (as a proxy for risk) and the number of annual residential moves (NMV). With the understanding that NMV and GS are likely not independent, the authors created addition and interaction models to understand how these variables may work in tandem to influence implement diversity and elaborateness. The results show that a shorter growing season (higher risk) and a lower number of moves are correlated with greater implement complexity. This analysis also divided the hunter-gatherers into two subgroups: a subgroup characterized by higher diversity of complex implements and more elaborate individual implements than predicted by the model, and a subgroup characterized by lower diversity and less elaborateness than predicted. These subgroups were found to correspond with the distinction between foragers (groups that move more-or-less as a unit while gathering) and collectors (groups that gather (logistically from a more-or-less fixed settlement), with the higher diversity subgroup being made up mostly of collectors and the lower diversity subgroup being made up mostly of foragers. Finally, the authors suggest that under conditions where population growth leads to increased density, foraging strategies will tend to shift to collector strategies in conjunction with increased elaborateness of implements to exploit resources with greater intensity.

This study examines the relationship between population pressure and socioeconomic complexity in a cross-cultural sample of hunter-gatherer groups. The author suggests a causal component to the positive correlations found, arguing that increasing population pressure on food resources requires increasing storage dependence, which in turn drives sedentism and other indicators of socioeconomic complexity.

This study examines relationships between subsistence type, population size, and sedentarism. Hunting, gathering, fishing, and herding societies tend to be smaller than horticultural and agricultural societies. Horticulture, agriculture, and fishing societies tend to be more sedentary.

Using a self selected sample of 33 ex British colonies and the Ethnic Power Relations database, the author sampled 170 ethnic groups from Africa, Asia, and the Middle East to test for association between precolonial state formation, colonial state building tactics, and modern ethnic conflicts. The author theorized that ethnic groups that were centrally governed before the colonial period were less likely to be recruited to colonial security forces, leaving them out of the picture during the formation of the independence movement and the formation of a post-colonial regime. This in turn is theorized to lead to greater contemporary armed conflict against the regime from which they were excluded.

This article presents a theory of evolutionary development of incest regulation, namely that as societal complexity increases the incest taboo will become less extensive. The author presents empirical support for this theory, though the association is not supported among simply structured societies. The role of descent type is also discussed.