Distribution patterns of stone-tool reduction: Establishing frames of reference to approximate occupational features and formation processes in Paleolithic societies

• We perform tool reduction analysis on a regional set of 15 lithic assemblages.
• The reduction value distribution shows differences in site use and occupation features.
• A simulated reduction space is created to interpret changes in reduction distributions.
• Raw material abundant short occupations are characterized by rapid tool discard.

The main goal of this work is to illustrate the interpretative potential of regionally oriented tool-use-life approaches to infer patterns of mobility, occupational intensity, and assemblage formation processes. We apply a wide reduction analysis to 15 Late Upper Paleolithic lithic assemblages. We perform an exploratory data analysis to observe reduction intensity tendencies among the different assemblages, and we characterize reduction distribution patterns using Weibull probability distribution functions. To avoid sampling effects, resampling and bootstrapping were performed. The Weibull profiles of the analyzed data show different degrees of occupational intensity and/or length that are not observable through the classical techno-typological approaches. A referential reduction space is also simulated to create a frame to interpret our results in a more absolute scale.