Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-g4j75 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-27T01:19:40.108Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Convergent cultural evolution may explain linguistic universals

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 October 2008

Christine A. Caldwell
Christine A. Caldwell
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of Stirling, Stirling, FK9 4LA, United Kingdomc.a.caldwell@stir.ac.ukhttp://www.psychology.stir.ac.uk/staff/ccaldwell/index.php
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Christiansen & Chater's (C&C's) argument rests on an assumption that convergent cultural evolution can produce similar (complex) behaviours in isolated populations. In this commentary, I describe how experiments recently carried out by Caldwell and colleagues can contribute to the understanding of such phenomena.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 31 , Issue 5 , October 2008 , pp. 515 - 516
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Caldwell, C. A. & Millen, A. E. (2008) Experimental models for testing hypotheses about cumulative cultural evolution. Evolution and Human Behavior 29:165–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deacon, T. W. (1997) The symbolic species: The co-evolution of language and the brain. W. W. Norton/Penguin.Google Scholar
Deacon, T. W. (2003a) Universal grammar and semiotic constraints. In: Language evolution, ed. Christiansen, M. H. & Kirby, S.. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Deacon, T. W. (2003b) Multilevel selection in a complex adaptive system: The problem of language origins. In: Evolution and learning: The Baldwin effect reconsidered, ed. Weber, B. H. & Depew, D. J.. MIT Press.Google Scholar
Mesoudi, A. (2007) Using the methods of experimental social psychology to study cultural evolution. Journal of Social, Evolutionary, and Cultural Psychology 1:35–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mesoudi, A. (2008) Foresight in cultural evolution. Biology and Philosophy 23:243–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mesoudi, A. & O'Brien, M. J. (2008) The cultural transmission of Great Basin projectile-point technology I: An experimental simulation. American Antiquity 73:3–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mesoudi, A., Whiten, A. & Laland, K. N. (2004) Is human cultural evolution Darwinian? Evidence reviewed from the perspective of The Origin of Species. Evolution 58:1–11.Google Scholar