How Do People Adapt to the Environment?
People adapt to the environment in several different ways in order to cope with changing environmental and climatological conditions on the planet. Humans have been adapting to the changing environment since the dawn of the species. Adaptation is a key factor in human evolution. Adapting to the environment is sometimes natural change that is reflective of environmental conditions, but other adaptations are the result of the innovation of the human mind.
Humans have adapted to rely on their sense of vision like all other primates over their other sensory receptors. This adaptation is likely the result of homosapiens becoming bipedal and having the ability to see further across landscapes. This is an example of a natural adaptation. Human beings now wear clothing, which was a lifestyle adaptation made by earlier humans to counter a cold environment or changes in the climate.
Some adaptations take place over the course of generations of individuals. The adaptation occurs as the mutated genome is diffused throughout the population. Other adaptations take place fairly quickly. When a person moves to a region with very high altitude, their body must acclimate to the smaller amount of oxygen in the air. At first, the person feels dizzy and light-headed, but eventually, the person acclimates, or adapts, to less oxygen.