United Kingdom

Cultural Evolution Society Conference 2024

Introductions

Welcome to the Cultural Evolution Society (CES) Conference 2024, which was a hybrid conference held at Durham University (UK). The conference was hosted in Durham by the Durham Cultural Evolution Research Centre (DCERC) with administrative assistance from the CES Transformation Fund team.

**For more information about the CES Conference, please visit the [CES Website Home Page](https://ces2024.webspace.durham.ac.uk/).**

#### Durham Cultural Evolution Research Centre (DCERC) 
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**Interdisciplinary study of cultural change and diversity**

We are a highly interdisciplinary group of researchers using evolutionary models to study cultural change and diversity.  We apply cultural evolutionary methods to a wide variety of topics including cognition, innovation, social learning, technology, art, music, narrative, religion, sociality, language and communication. We have a growing interest in applying cultural evolutionary theory to current societal challenges such as understanding the spread of prosocial health behaviours and health conspiracies.<br>
**[Discover More](https://www.durham.ac.uk/research/institutes-and-centres/cultural-evolution/)**

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If you feel at any time you have been the victim of harassment or inappropriate behavior that contradicts our code of conduct, you may use the following form to report the incident. 

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The field of cultural evolution is growing in size and scope; its theories, methods and applications - both academic and applied - are getting ever more robust. Do join us in what promises to be an exciting exchange of ideas and a celebration of our field.

**Abstract:**

Existing models of cumulative cultural evolution suggest that cultural complexity is facilitated by high-fidelity cultural transmission and demographic factors, such as population size. However, models and theory tend to neglect the role of asocial learning in the evolution of cumulative culture, unrealistically treating brains as passive receptacles of socially learned information that increase linearly in size and storage capacity as culture accumulates. Here we address this omission by combining artificial neural network simulations and agent-based models to provide a bottom-up mechanistic understanding of the computational capabilities that neural architectures acquire as they increase in size and alter in morphology. Our more realistic model of brain-culture coevolution generates a biologically feasible nonlinear relationship between brain size, neocortical modularity, and cultural cognition, resembling observed neurological differences between human and nonhuman primates. At optimal network modularity and over a critical size threshold, associative learning and inference give way to new capacities for recursive analogy parsing, generation of arbitrary symbolic associations, and an ability to recall and recombine ideas from uncorrelated domains of cultural knowledge without external cues. Including this within existing models of cumulative culture demonstrates that increasing cultural complexity depends upon recursive imagination, transmission fidelity and demography in equal measure.

**Speaker's social media:**

Twitter: @AseSergiou

RECORDING - The Role of brain size, neural architecture and recursive imagination in the evolution of cumulative culture

**Abstract:**

Despite the crucial role of social learning strategies (SLS) in human cultural evolution, their exact nature remains elusive. Traditionally, SLS have been viewed as domain-specific, fixed heuristics.  However, mounting evidence challenges this perspective, suggesting that SLS are more adaptable and influenced by individual experiences. Here, we present a formal and empirical investigation into the role of domain-general reward learning in shaping SLS.
Drawing upon associative learning theory, we propose the Social Feature Learning (SFL) model, which posits that individuals learn to associate social cues with personal rewards. We contrast the SFL model against the traditional heuristic account in four experiments (n = 1300), and consistently find it to provide a superior account of social learning. To establish the scope of the SFL model beyond the experiments, we used agent-based modeling and found that many classic SLS naturally emerge from reward learning mechanisms. 
In summary, this research provides a novel perspective on SLS, emphasizing the central role of reward learning. Our findings address empirical challenges to the traditional account and provide a parsimonious, mechanistic explanation of SLS.  Our account contributes to a deeper understanding of the mechanisms driving social learning, bridging theory and empirical evidence in the study of cultural evolution.

**Speaker's social media:**

Twitter: @B_Lindstroem

LIVE - Social learning strategies are shaped by reward learning

**Abstract:**

Patrick Tort demonstrated that, in his 1871 work, Darwin transposed his theory of descent modified by means of natural selection to the civilizational process. However, this 'transition to culture' (Tort, 1985) underwent historical omission because the logic Darwin followed to make this transposition was not correctly understood. This failure in the reception of Darwin's logic has been used to provide a biological argument for Herbert Spencer's ultra-liberal ideology, Francis Galton's eugenics, and Walter Lippman's neoliberalism, which is now hegemonic in international organizations. But how is it that this error, 150 years old and locally corrected in an increasing number of scientific fields, can still reinforce neoliberal ideology instead of highlighting the deleterious consequences of the fundamental error on which this ideology was theorized? Is there a necessity, or a mechanical link, to understand the persistence of neoliberal ideology to the peril of the entire civilization that enables its existence? The purpose of this proposition is to demonstrate how the circular causality that naturally characterizes both cultural evolution and the 'mode of existence of technical objects' (Simondon, 1958) can help answer these questions.

**Speaker's social media:**

ORCID : https://orcid.org/my-orcid?orcid=0000-0003-2703-8431

On the reversing effect of cultural and technical evolution with Gilbert Simondon (1958)

**Abstract:**

Pilgrimage has received longstanding scholarly attention, but we still lack a clear theory of how these rituals emerge. Current theories argue that pilgrimage acts as a signal: the effort required to engage in it might showcase the sincerity of the believer and/or their commitment to the community associated with the ritual. While these explanations can be useful for understanding the transmission and maintenance of costly rituals, they fall short when it comes to explaining their emergence. Using data from a new pilgrimage in the Peruvian altiplano, we address this gap by outlining a theoretical framework more capable of accounting for how these phenomena start. The framework of an assurance game captures the emergence of collective rituals like pilgrimage and allows us to incorporate key features of our empirical case. We then discuss two issues that can help us understand the early adoption of pilgrimages: the linkages that exist between sites in an ecology of rituals, and the social connections through which information about new practices spreads. Thus, we provide a theoretical framework through which we can understand the emergence of costly, collective rituals, and we examine the features that might characterize the early adopters of such practices.

**Speaker's social media:**

@nicolasrestrepo.bsky.social

Theoretical puzzles and new empirical avenues around the emergence of a New Pilgrimage

**Abstract:**

Over the last decade, the global decline of religion has taken center stage (Davies, 2022; Gabbatt; 2023; NPR, 2015). Yet thus far, most of what is known about declining religiosity focuses on the Western world and on wealthy East Asian nations such as Japan. Much less is known about religious trajectories in Southeast Asia, which includes some of the most religious nations in the world (Gallup International Survey, 2017). This study examines religiosity among two cohorts of adolescents growing up in northern Thailand—historically an overwhelmingly Buddhist region (Cassaniti, 2015; McKenzie et al., 2019). In 2012, in-depth interviews were conducted and surveys were administered with 40 Millennial adolescents (Mage = 17.30), evenly divided across rural and urban settings. In 2023, the same data collection techniques were employed with 60 Gen Z adolescents (Mage = 17.47) in the same settings. Chi-squared analysis of religious identification, and analysis of variances of religious practices and religious values, reveal significant religious change over time among Thai adolescents in rural and urban settings. Results will be contextualized alongside rapid cultural and technological change in Thailand from 2012—2023, and implications for youth in other rapidly globalizing nations will be discussed.

**Speaker's social media:**

Instagram and Facebook: @sadakonooonadesu

Buddhist, not Buddhist, sorta Buddhist? Tracking religious change among adolescents in Thailand over a decade

**Abstract:**

Cladistics is a method used in Biology to test phylogenetic hypotheses. In this paper, we aim to explore the application of Cladistics to Archaeology by assuming that particular kinds of characters can be used to organize pottery from archaeological sites in historically meaningful trees. We have analysed several characters associated to painting, temper, rim shapes, and surface treatments and finishes from 15 archaeological sites associated to the Late Holocene Tupiguarani Tradition from São Paulo state, Brazil. We generated a total of 12 trees. Seven trees, related to painting as well as surface treatment and finishes point to a persistent association between two sites from the coast in opposition to inland sites. On the other hand, when only the rim shapes are analyzed, the other five trees do not support a clear separation between the coastal and inland sites. The cladistic approach was useful to build and test hypothesis related to the cultural transmission and ancestor-descendant relation among coastal and inland sites associated to the Tupiguarani Tradition.

**Speaker's social media:**

Twitter: @leeh_usp Instagram: @leehibusp

The use of cladistics to explore cultural diversity in Tupiguarani tradition pottery from São Paulo State, Brazil

**Abstract:**

Human cultural evolution relies on the spread of complex social contagions - such as linguistic categories and behavioral norms - that require sustained reinforcement by multiple contacts in a social network. In this work, we propose a novel modeling technique that allows us to take any social network and identify the pathways through which complex contagions are most likely to flow, as well as the network regions (i.e., structural attractors) that complex contagions are most likely to flow toward. This technique identifies the global directional flow dynamics for social contagions in any given network, and thus identifies the core structural backbone for how cultural innovations will rise and spread in a population. We further show how our method allows us to pinpoint which actors and communities in a network are most essential in accelerating the spread of complex contagions, and by consequence, which network regions would be most disruptive to the spread of complex contagions if these network regions were eroded or rewired. To demonstrate, we simulate a range of intervention strategies which show how we can systematically accelerate or halt the spread of complex contagions through targeted network ablations or pruning. Based on these findings, we characterize a class of strategies for controlling and optimizing the spread of complex contagions and thereby processes of cultural evolution. Implications for the origins and future of human cultural evolution are discussed.

**Speaker's social media:**

http://www.linkedin.com/in/fabiantschofenig/

RECORDING - Identifying and manipulating complex paths and attractors in human cultural evolution

Through long-term research with bearded capuchin monkeys (Sapajus libidinosus) in Fazenda Boa Vista, Brazil, we have deepened our understanding of tool use by non-human primates. Nut cracking with tools is a skill developed through socially mediated individual learning, resulting from the availability of fruits and hard stones. Learning this skill affects the development of perception, attention, and memory. Nut-cracking on anvil sites also increases direct competition among group members, steepening the female dominance hierarchy. Finally, the use of tools to obtain nut kernels substantially increases the diet quality of these monkeys. While the tradition  of nut cracking with stone tools impacts the lives of bearded capuchin monkeys in many ways, recent studies indicate that habitat anthropization is threatening this tradition. Thus, we must act to protect capuchin monkeys.

A tough nut to crack: what research with wild capuchin monkeys reveals about the tradition of tool use

The modern field of cultural evolution emerged in the 1970s, in the aftermath of the ‘race and IQ’ and ‘human sociobiology’ debates, as a direct counter to extreme hereditarian positions. Yet, despite genetic data refuting any suggestion of racial substructure to human populations, naive interpretations of race that advertently or inadvertently perpetuate racist ideas remain prevalent across the biological sciences, including concerning ancestry, health, sport, and intelligence. A cultural evolution perspective can help identify unwarranted reductionist and determinist claims while providing a more inclusive multidisciplinary framework with which to interpret human variation. Natural and social scientists have an important role to play in disseminating the multifaceted explanation for racial disparities to the wider public.

Genes, culture, and scientific racism

**Abstract:**

This abstract is for a master’s thesis. Data collection will be completed before September. 

The rice theory of culture hypotheses that wet-rice farming fosters the development of collectivistic cultures. This study aims to determine whether the rice theory of culture can predict between-prefecture variation in the degree of collectivism/individualism in Japan. Utilizing agricultural data in conjunction with self-report data from 4,254 respondents to the Japanese Social Survey (JGSS), I tested whether the proportion of agricultural land set aside for wet-rice farming in each prefecture predicted cross-prefecture variation in collectivism. In a second analysis, this study assessed whether the historical duration for which peoples have been wet-rice farming predicts cross-regional variation in collectivism. In order to answer this question, this study introduced a novel methodology, incorporating archaeological data for the introduction of rice farming to various regions of Japan. As far as the author is aware, this is the first time a study has analyzed whether temporal “dosing” of exposure to rice farming practices predicts cross-regional variation in psychology. Through its use of archaeological and JGSS data, this work tests the rice theory of culture in previously unexplored ways and investigates the origins of regional psychological variation across Japan.


**Speaker's social media:**

Twitter: @LiamMcClainAnthro

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