Although his interests span the entire record of human evolution, his research largely pertains to the last 10,000 years, a period of dynamic change in health, well-being, and lifestyle, much of which relates to population increase, overcrowding, and nutritional decline that co-occurred with the transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture, creating living conditions that humans are grappling with to the present day.
Larsen attended Kansas State University (BA, Anthropology, 1974), where he studied with archaeologist Patricia J. O'Brien and physical anthropologists William M. Bass III and Michael Finnegan.
[2][3] Following his freshman and sophomore years, he worked with Smithsonian Institution physical anthropologists, Douglas H. Ubelaker and T. Dale Stewart, on field projects in South Dakota (1971) and Maryland (1972) and subsequently with American Museum of Natural History archaeologist David Hurst Thomas in Nevada (1973, 1974).
This research program is part of a decades-long (1975– ) collaboration with the American Museum of Natural History involving the study of health, dietary, and economic changes prior to and after the arrival of Europeans and the establishment of the mission system in Spanish Florida.
[5] Larsen has played a lead role in the study of ancient human remains in other regions of North America (Great Basin, Nevada), at Çatalhöyük (Turkey)[6] (cite Wiki), and Badia Pozzeveri[7] (Tuscany, Italy).