Mechanisms by which parasites influence cultures, and why they matter

2012 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 91-92 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Schaller ◽  
Damian R. Murray
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Developmental Plasticity ◽  
Genetic Evolution ◽  
Human Psychology ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
Rigorous Research ◽  
Mediating Mechanisms

AbstractAt least four conceptually distinct mechanisms may mediate relations between parasite-stress and cultural outcomes: genetic evolution, developmental plasticity, neurocognitive flexibility, and cultural transmission. These mechanisms may operate independently or in conjunction with one another. Rigorous research on specific mediating mechanisms is required to more completely articulate implications of parasite stress on human psychology and human culture.

Cultural evolution and cultural psychology

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex Mesoudi
Keyword(s):  
Cultural History ◽  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Cultural Psychology ◽  
Phylogenetic Analyses ◽  
Cultural Dimensions ◽  
Human Cognition ◽  
Cultural Variation ◽  
Cultural Inheritance ◽  
Human Psychology

Cultural evolution is a branch of the evolutionary sciences which assumes that (i) human cognition and behaviour is shaped not only by genetic inheritance, but also cultural inheritance (also known as social learning), and (ii) this cultural inheritance constitutes a Darwinian evolutionary system that can be analysed and studied using tools borrowed from evolutionary biology. In this chapter I explore the numerous compatibilities between the fields of cultural evolution and cultural psychology, and the potential mutual benefits from their closer alignment. First, understanding the evolutionary context within which human psychology emerged gives added significance to the findings of cultural psychologists, which reinforce the conclusion reached by cultural evolution scholars that humans inhabit a ‘cultural niche’ within which the major means of adaptation to difference environments is cultural, rather than genetic. Hence, we should not be surprised that human psychology shows substantial cross-cultural variation. Second, a focus on cultural transmission pathways, drawing on cultural evolution models and empirical research, can help to explain to the maintenance of, and potential changes in, cultural variation in psychological processes. Evidence from migrants, in particular, points to a mix of vertical, oblique and horizontal cultural transmission that can explain the differential stability of different cultural dimensions. Third, cultural evolutionary methods offer powerful means of testing historical (“macro-evolutionary”) hypotheses put forward by cultural psychologists for the origin of psychological differences. Explanations in terms of means of subsistence, rates of environmental change or pathogen prevalence can be tested using quantitative models and phylogenetic analyses that can be used to reconstruct cultural lineages. Evolutionary considerations also point to potential problems with current cross-country comparisons conducted within cultural psychology, such as the non-independence of data points due to shared cultural history. Finally, I argue that cultural psychology can play a central role in a synthetic evolutionary science of culture, providing valuable links between individual-oriented disciplines such as experimental psychology and neuroscience on the one hand, and society-oriented disciplines such as anthropology, history and sociology on the other, all within an evolutionary framework that provides links to the biological sciences.

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Lewens
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Potential Functions ◽  
Human Psychology ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
The Third ◽  
Current State ◽  
Large Numbers ◽  
The Social ◽  
Compare And Contrast

Many evolutionary theorists have enthusiastically embraced human nature, but large numbers of evolutionists have also rejected it. It is also important to recognize the nuanced views on human nature that come from the side of the social sciences. This introduction provides an overview of the current state of the human nature debate, from the anti-essentialist consensus to the possibility of a Gray’s Anatomy of human psychology. Three potential functions for the notion of species nature are identified. The first is diagnostic, assigning an organism to the correct species. The second is species-comparative, allowing us to compare and contrast different species. The third function is contrastive, establishing human nature as a foil for human culture. The Introduction concludes with a brief synopsis of each chapter.

Genomic Imprinting and the Cognitive Architecture Mediating Human Culture

2001 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 251-258 ◽  
Author(s):  
William Michael Brown
Keyword(s):  
Genomic Imprinting ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Cognitive Architecture ◽  
Transmitted Information ◽  
Human Culture

AbstractGenomic imprinting may be implicated in the origin and maintenance of the cognitive architecture required for cultural transmission. Relatedness asymmetries are expected to lead to increases in the receptibility of matrilineally transmitted information. This may help explain why maternal genes contribute preferentially to the neocortex. That is, maternal genes could influence biases in the transmission and/or acquisition of information. This perspective is complementary to gene-culture coevolutionary approaches.

Darwinian cultural evolution rivals genetic evolution

2006 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 360-360 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Pagel
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Genetic Evolution ◽  
Evolutionary Perspective ◽  
Human Intentionality

The study of culture from an evolutionary perspective has been slowed by resistance from some quarters of anthropology, a poor appreciation of the fidelity of cultural transmission, and misunderstandings about human intentionality.

Transportation, Transformation, and Metaphoricity

2019 ◽  
pp. 28-51
Author(s):  
Veronika Pöhnl
Keyword(s):  
Media Studies ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Media Theory ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
Material Conditions ◽  
Cultural Media

This chapter discusses similarities of and differences between the epistemological premises of ANT and German media theory concerning concepts of transmission. The applicability of ANT for media investigations and the compatibility of ANT concepts in media studies have been discussed intensively for several years now. The profound similarities as well as the critical differences in the study of the material conditions of human culture have also stimulated current reconsiderations and reformulations in cultural media studies, as German media theory is most commonly called in Germany. The chapter gives a brief overview of recently published approaches to cultural techniques and intersections of media and techno-philosophy that are increasingly being translated into English and therefore also internationally accessible, alongside with the discussion concerning their compatibility with ANT in respect of cultural transmission.

scholarly journals Selection, adaptation, inheritance and design in human culture: the view from the Price equation

2020 ◽  
Vol 375 (1797) ◽  
pp. 20190358 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Nettle
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Darwinian Evolution ◽  
Price Equation ◽  
Cultural Traditions ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
Cultural Systems ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Minimal Description ◽  
Cultural Evolutionary ◽  
The Mind

For decades, parts of the literature on human culture have been gripped by an analogy: culture changes in a way that is substantially isomorphic to genetic evolution. This leads to a number of sub-claims: that design-like properties in cultural traditions should be explained in a parallel way to the design-like features of organisms, namely with reference to selection; that culture is a system of inheritance; and that cultural evolutionary processes can produce adaptation in the genetic sense. The Price equation provides a minimal description of any evolutionary system, and a method for identifying the action of selection. As such, it helps clarify some of these claims about culture conceptually. Looking closely through the lens of the Price equation, the differences between genes and culture come into sharp relief. Culture is only a system of inheritance metaphorically, or as an idealization, and the idealization may lead us to overlook causally important features of how cultural influence works. Design-like properties in cultural systems may owe more to transmission biases than to cultural selection. Where culture enhances genetic fitness, it is ambiguous whether what is doing the work is cultural transmission, or just the genetically evolved properties of the mind. I conclude that there are costs to trying to press culture into a template based on Darwinian evolution, even if one broadens the definition of ‘Darwinian’. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Fifty years of the Price equation’.

scholarly journals Culture evolves

2011 ◽  
Vol 366 (1567) ◽  
pp. 938-948 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Whiten ◽  
Robert A. Hinde ◽  
Kevin N. Laland ◽  
Christopher B. Stringer
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Evolutionary Biology ◽  
Animal Kingdom ◽  
Diverse Range ◽  
Scientific Methods ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
The World ◽  
Contrary View ◽  
Ancient Times

Culture pervades human lives and has allowed our species to create niches all around the world and its oceans, in ways quite unlike any other primate. Indeed, our cultural nature appears so distinctive that it is often thought to separate humanity from the rest of nature and the Darwinian forces that shape it. A contrary view arises through the recent discoveries of a diverse range of disciplines, here brought together to illustrate the scope of a burgeoning field of cultural evolution and to facilitate cross-disciplinary fertilization. Each approach emphasizes important linkages between culture and evolutionary biology rather than quarantining one from the other. Recent studies reveal that processes important in cultural transmission are more widespread and significant across the animal kingdom than earlier recognized, with important implications for evolutionary theory. Recent archaeological discoveries have pushed back the origins of human culture to much more ancient times than traditionally thought. These developments suggest previously unidentified continuities between animal and human culture. A third new array of discoveries concerns the later diversification of human cultures, where the operations of Darwinian-like processes are identified, in part, through scientific methods borrowed from biology. Finally, surprising discoveries have been made about the imprint of cultural evolution in the predispositions of human minds for cultural transmission.

scholarly journals Cumulative cultural learning: Development and diversity

2017 ◽  
Vol 114 (30) ◽  
pp. 7877-7883 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cristine H. Legare
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Diversity ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Living Systems ◽  
Cultural Learning ◽  
Causal Account ◽  
Beliefs And Practices ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
Acquisition Strategies ◽  
Learning Development ◽  
Insight Into

The complexity and variability of human culture is unmatched by any other species. Humans live in culturally constructed niches filled with artifacts, skills, beliefs, and practices that have been inherited, accumulated, and modified over generations. A causal account of the complexity of human culture must explain its distinguishing characteristics: It is cumulative and highly variable within and across populations. I propose that the psychological adaptations supporting cumulative cultural transmission are universal but are sufficiently flexible to support the acquisition of highly variable behavioral repertoires. This paper describes variation in the transmission practices (teaching) and acquisition strategies (imitation) that support cumulative cultural learning in childhood. Examining flexibility and variation in caregiver socialization and children’s learning extends our understanding of evolution in living systems by providing insight into the psychological foundations of cumulative cultural transmission—the cornerstone of human cultural diversity.

Charismatic and Transformational Leadership

2006 ◽  
Vol 50 (4) ◽  
pp. 203-214 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy A. Judge ◽  
Erin Fluegge Woolf ◽  
Charlice Hurst ◽  
Beth Livingston
Keyword(s):  
Transformational Leadership ◽  
Leadership Theories ◽  
Organizational Research ◽  
The Past ◽  
Causal Direction ◽  
Transformationale Führung ◽  
Rigorous Research ◽  
Research Designs ◽  
Mediating Mechanisms ◽  
Insight Into

Charismatische und transformationale Führung: Ein Überblick und eine Agenda für zukünftige Forschungsarbeiten Abstract. Of all the leadership theories in organizational research, charismatic/transformational leadership has captured scholars' interest most over the past decade. This article reviews what has been learned about the antecedents of charismatic and transformational leadership, their effects on individual and collective outcomes across cultures, and moderators of those effects. We conclude with a set of recommendations for moving this field of study forward, including a call for more rigorous research designs that provide greater insight into the process of transformational leadership (i.e., causal direction and mediating mechanisms), further conceptual clarifications, and further integration with other schools of leadership thought.

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