The evolutionary anthropologist Eric Smith has recently suggested that there are three styles in the evolutionary analysis of human behaviour (Smith 2000): evolutionary psychology, behavioural ecology and dual inheritance theory. The second style represents what we might call the classical Darwinian view, drawing its inspiration from the assumption that in evolutionary terms humans are little different from any other animal, simply another unique species. Accordingly, we can assume that, since humans are the outcome of a long history of natural selection a long line of reproductively successful ancestors they have a propensity to take decisions, consciously or unconsciously, in the light of the costs and benefits of the consequences of those decisions for their future reproductive success. What explains diversity in behaviour in the present and recent past is the different pay-offs for different courses of action in different environments. Humans can weigh up these and respond to them, often quite unconsciously, thanks to the flexibility of their behaviour. It is generally assumed that culture does not make much difference in this process because any cultural behaviour which leads to deviation from the best outcome in terms of the reproductive cost-benefit calculus will not last very long. This is the approach with which this volume of World Archaeology is concerned. The most widespread methodology based on these assumptions is optimal foraging theory and it is strongly represented here. It generates predictions about the subsistence strategies which will give people the best cost-benefit outcome in any given set of circumstances and compares them with actual subsistence strategies, or, in the case of archaeology, compares their predicted residues with those found in the archaeological record. As so often is the case, this archaeological comparison is not a trivial task and a number of the case studies presented here address it. The aim of this introduction is to briefly explain the background to the approach. It was only after World War II that biologists turned to the evolutionary study of animal behaviour. This involved looking at behaviour in terms of selection; that is to say, looking at how variations in behaviour relate to variations in survival, in reproduction and in the rearing of offspring. It assumes, therefore, that behaviour is to some extent at least genetically determined. This is quite easy for us to imagine in the case of organisms such as insects, but at first sight it is harder to conceive in relation to more complex animals, which have a capacity for learning that can give them considerable behavioural flexibility.
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