If there were multiple technological traditions present in the Americas at roughly the same time, it suggests either that there were multiple founding populations that developed different technologies, or that a single founding population rapidly differentiated into regional technological traditions as it spread through different environments.

The Paisley evidence alone could not distinguish between these possibilities, but it added to a growing body of evidence suggesting that the early archaeological record of the Americas was more complex than the Clovis-first model had allowed for.

Critically, the 2012 paper also noted the absence of diagnostic Clovis technology from the Paisley Caves assemblage.

The caves did not contain the distinctive fluted Clovis points that would be expected if the site’s occupants were part of the Clovis cultural tradition.

This absence — which is never straightforward to interpret, since the absence of specific artifacts can reflect sampling bias, functional specialization, or genuine cultural difference — was argued by the authors to support the interpretation that the Paisley people were not Clovis but instead were part of a separate technological tradition that was present in the Far West at or before the time of the Clovis expansion.