Revisiting Decision-Making Assumptions to Improve Deforestation Predictions : Evidence from the Amazon

Commercial agriculture is one of the primary drivers of global deforestation, although the contribution of small-scale agriculture is increasing. Despite that, there are limited studies about the decision-making process of non-Western Educated Industrialized Rich Democratic societies. Hence, research and policies on land use/land cover change often assume smallholders’ behavior is driven by monetary/food goals (Income Optimization), disregarding previous evidence suggesting otherwise. People may seek to minimize work drudgeries (Time Optimization) or violate rational principles by establishing a minimum amount of working time (Time Budget). Through two agent-based LUCC models, we investigated which of two alternative decision-making assumptions-Time Optimization or Time Budget-best explained Khĩsêtjê’s behavior, a Brazilian Amazon indigenous society, by comparing deforestation predictions with historical records. Our results suggest indigenous people's decisions follow more closely the Budget predictions based on (less used) minimum working time assumptions, regardless of food returns. The results imply that time categorization may be more prevalent than initially anticipated, which could influence how people use their lands more broadly