Original ArticlesThe Evolution of Conformist Transmission and the Emergence of Between-Group Differences
Section snippets
Cultural evolution as a problem in population dynamics
In humans, social learning gives rise to cumulative cultural change not seen in other animals, and, as a result, understanding human evolution requires new principles not relevant to the study of other species (Boyd and Richerson 1996). This does not mean that humans have somehow transcended biology. Quite to the contrary, we can construct a foundation for emergent cultural phenomena by understanding the evolution of complex cognitive adaptations. Evolutionary psychology proposes that all
Modeling the evolution of social learning and conformist transmission
We assume that the central adaptive problem facing individuals is how to best use environmental cues to choose behavior when the environment changes in space and time. For the purpose of modeling this situation, we have divided environmental cues into two kinds: nonsocial and social. Nonsocial cues predict the current environmental state, but these cues are imperfect. Relying on the nonsocial cues alone will allow individuals to do better than random, but will sometimes lead to errors.
Results
By systematically varying ρ, the accuracy of environmental information, m, the migration rate, ϵ, the degree of environmental stability, and n, the number of subpopulations, we have learned several important things about the evolution of social learning and conformist transmission. First, the degree of reliance on social learning (L) depends on strongly on the accuracy of environmental information (ρ) and the frequency of environmental fluctuations (1 − ϵ). The evolution of high values of L
Why is conformist transmission important?
Conformist transmission accounts for the fact that there is “heritable” cultural variation among human groups. Humans live in cultural groups in which group members tend to believe similar things about the world and behave in similar ways. Individuals in neighboring groups tend to believe different things and behave in different ways, even though people from different groups may interact and even intermarry. Conformist transmission generates a population-level process that creates and maintains
Conclusions
In the preceding discussion, we have reached several conclusions regarding the evolution of social learning, conformist transmission, and the emergence of within-group similarities and between group differences. We summarize them as follows:
- 1.
Our model indicates that conformist transmission is favored by selection under a wide range of conditions. Conformist transmission evolves in fluctuating environments; it evolves when the accuracy of environmental information is poor and when it is fairly
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