Because archaeology is basically concerned with people, it forms an important subdivision of the social science of anthropology. Archaeologists are interested in knowing where these sites are so they can be protected and preserved for study and for the benefit of future generations. Relationships between sites used at the same time can help archaeologists learn about social, religious, and political links that may have characterized a region. Archaeologists often focus their investigations on a single site. Problems relating to understanding past human behavior guide and focus the study of that site as archaeologists excavate it.
Excavation is performed to recover relationships between material objects left by human behavior.
Archaeologists generally work with vast periods of time and wish to understand changes in human behavior. Archaeology is a study that intrigues us tremendously. We want to know about the past. About things that happened that were perhaps important. The finds are perhaps not great, but they were the product of human behavior made by people who were not unlike ourselves in many ways.