Behavioural variation in 172 small-scale societies indicates that social learning is the main mode of human adaptation
Sarah Mathew, Charles Perreault
CLAS-SS: Human Origins, Institute of (IHO)
CLAS-SS: Human Evolution and Social Change, School of (SHESC)
The behavioural variation among human societies is vast and unmatched in the animal world. It is unclear whether this variation is due to variation in the ecological environment or to differences in cultural traditions. Underlying this debate is a more fundamental question: is the richness of humans' behavioural repertoire due to non-cultural mechanisms, such as causal reasoning, inventiveness, reaction norms, trial-and-error learning and evoked culture, or is it due to the population-level dynamics of cultural transmission? Here, we measure the relative contribution of environment and cultural history in explaining the behavioural variation of 172 Native American tribes at the time of European contact.We find that the effect of cultural history is typically larger than that of environment. Behaviours also persist over millennia within cultural lineages. This indicates that human behaviour is not predominantly determined by single-generation adaptive responses, contra theories that emphasize non-cultural mechanisms as determinants of human behaviour. Rather, the main mode of human adaptation is social learning mechanisms that operate over multiple generations.
cultural tradition
reaction norm
tribal peoples
North American Indians
Population Dynamics
Cognitive niche hypothesis
Cultural evolution
Cultural inertia
Evoked culture
Human behavioural ecology
Agricultural and Biological Sciences(all)
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology(all)
Environmental Science(all)
Immunology and Microbiology(all)
Medicine(all)
Mathew, S., & Perreault, C. (2015). Behavioural variation in 172 small-scale societies indicates that social learning is the main mode of human adaptation. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 282(1810). https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2015.0061
Behavioural variation in 172 small-scale societies indicates that social learning is the main mode of human adaptation. / Mathew, Sarah; Perreault, Charles.
In: Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, Vol. 282, No. 1810, 2015.
Mathew, S & Perreault, C 2015, 'Behavioural variation in 172 small-scale societies indicates that social learning is the main mode of human adaptation' Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, vol. 282, no. 1810. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2015.0061
Mathew S, Perreault C. Behavioural variation in 172 small-scale societies indicates that social learning is the main mode of human adaptation. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 2015;282(1810). https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2015.0061
Mathew, Sarah ; Perreault, Charles. / Behavioural variation in 172 small-scale societies indicates that social learning is the main mode of human adaptation. In: Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 2015 ; Vol. 282, No. 1810.
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title = "Behavioural variation in 172 small-scale societies indicates that social learning is the main mode of human adaptation",
abstract = "The behavioural variation among human societies is vast and unmatched in the animal world. It is unclear whether this variation is due to variation in the ecological environment or to differences in cultural traditions. Underlying this debate is a more fundamental question: is the richness of humans' behavioural repertoire due to non-cultural mechanisms, such as causal reasoning, inventiveness, reaction norms, trial-and-error learning and evoked culture, or is it due to the population-level dynamics of cultural transmission? Here, we measure the relative contribution of environment and cultural history in explaining the behavioural variation of 172 Native American tribes at the time of European contact.We find that the effect of cultural history is typically larger than that of environment. Behaviours also persist over millennia within cultural lineages. This indicates that human behaviour is not predominantly determined by single-generation adaptive responses, contra theories that emphasize non-cultural mechanisms as determinants of human behaviour. Rather, the main mode of human adaptation is social learning mechanisms that operate over multiple generations.",
keywords = "Cognitive niche hypothesis, Cultural evolution, Cultural inertia, Evoked culture, Human behavioural ecology, Social learning",
author = "Sarah Mathew and Charles Perreault",
doi = "10.1098/rspb.2015.0061",
journal = "Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences",
publisher = "Royal Society of London",
number = "1810",
T1 - Behavioural variation in 172 small-scale societies indicates that social learning is the main mode of human adaptation
AU - Mathew, Sarah
AU - Perreault, Charles
N2 - The behavioural variation among human societies is vast and unmatched in the animal world. It is unclear whether this variation is due to variation in the ecological environment or to differences in cultural traditions. Underlying this debate is a more fundamental question: is the richness of humans' behavioural repertoire due to non-cultural mechanisms, such as causal reasoning, inventiveness, reaction norms, trial-and-error learning and evoked culture, or is it due to the population-level dynamics of cultural transmission? Here, we measure the relative contribution of environment and cultural history in explaining the behavioural variation of 172 Native American tribes at the time of European contact.We find that the effect of cultural history is typically larger than that of environment. Behaviours also persist over millennia within cultural lineages. This indicates that human behaviour is not predominantly determined by single-generation adaptive responses, contra theories that emphasize non-cultural mechanisms as determinants of human behaviour. Rather, the main mode of human adaptation is social learning mechanisms that operate over multiple generations.
AB - The behavioural variation among human societies is vast and unmatched in the animal world. It is unclear whether this variation is due to variation in the ecological environment or to differences in cultural traditions. Underlying this debate is a more fundamental question: is the richness of humans' behavioural repertoire due to non-cultural mechanisms, such as causal reasoning, inventiveness, reaction norms, trial-and-error learning and evoked culture, or is it due to the population-level dynamics of cultural transmission? Here, we measure the relative contribution of environment and cultural history in explaining the behavioural variation of 172 Native American tribes at the time of European contact.We find that the effect of cultural history is typically larger than that of environment. Behaviours also persist over millennia within cultural lineages. This indicates that human behaviour is not predominantly determined by single-generation adaptive responses, contra theories that emphasize non-cultural mechanisms as determinants of human behaviour. Rather, the main mode of human adaptation is social learning mechanisms that operate over multiple generations.
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KW - Cultural evolution
KW - Cultural inertia
KW - Evoked culture
KW - Human behavioural ecology
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DO - 10.1098/rspb.2015.0061
JO - Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
JF - Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
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