The Biological Roots of Music and Dance : Extending the Credible Signaling Hypothesis to Predator Deterrence

Human musical capacity and products should have been induced by the hominin-specific combination of several biosocial features: A three-phase scheme on socio-ecological, cognitive, and cultural evolution

Various selection pressures have shaped human uniqueness, for instance, music. When and why did musical universality and diversity emerge? Our hypothesis is that "music" initially originated from manipulative calls with limited musical elements. Thereafter, vocalizations became more complex and flexible along with a greater degree of social learning. Finally, constructed musical instruments and the language faculty resulted in diverse and context-specific music. Music precursors correspond to vocal communication among nonhuman primates, songbirds, and cetaceans. To place this scenario in hominin history, a three-phase scheme for music evolution is presented herein. We emphasize (1) the evolution of sociality and life history in australopithecines, (2) the evolution of cognitive and learning abilities in early/middle Homo, and (3) cultural evolution, primarily in Homo sapiens. Human musical capacity and products should be due to the hominin-specific combination of several biosocial features, including bipedalism, stable pair bonding, alloparenting, expanded brain size, and sexual selection.

Surfing uncertainty with screams: predictive processing, error dynamics and horror films

Despite tremendous efforts in psychology, neuroscience and media and cultural studies, it is still something of a mystery why humans are attracted to fictional content that is horrifying, disgusting or otherwise aversive. While the psychological benefits of horror films, stories, video games, etc. has recently been demonstrated empirically, current theories emphasizing the negative and positive consequences of this engagement often contradict one another. Here, we suggest the predictive processing framework may provide a unifying account of horror content engagement that provides clear and testable hypotheses, and explains why a 'sweet spot' of fear and fun exists in horror entertainment. This article is part of the theme issue 'Art, aesthetics and predictive processing: theoretical and empirical perspectives'.

Music production and its role in coalition signaling during foraging contexts in a hunter-gatherer society

Music is a cultural activity universally present in all human societies. Several hypotheses have been formulated to understand the possible origins of music and the reasons for its emergence. Here, we test two hypotheses: (1) the coalition signaling hypothesis which posits that music could have emerged as a tool to signal cooperative intent and signal strength of alliances and (2) music as a strategy to deter potential predators. In addition, we further explore the link between tactile cues and the propensity of mothers to sing toward infants. For this, we investigated the singing behaviors of hunter-gatherer mothers during daily foraging trips among the Mbendjele BaYaka in the Republic of the Congo. Although singing is a significant component of their daily activities, such as when walking in the forest or collecting food sources, studies on human music production in hunter-gatherer societies are mostly conducted during their ritual ceremonies. In this study, we collected foraging and singing behavioral data of mothers by using focal follows of five BaYaka women during their foraging trips in the forest. In accordance with our predictions for the coalition signaling hypothesis, women were more likely to sing when present in large groups, especially when group members were less familiar. However, predictions of the predation deterrence hypothesis were not supported as the interaction between group size and distance from the village did not have a significant effect on the likelihood of singing. The latter may be due to limited variation in predation risk in the foraging areas, because of the intense bush meat trade, and hence, future studies should include foraging areas with higher densities of wild animals. Lastly, we found that mothers were more likely to sing when they were carrying infants compared to when infants were close, but carried by others, supporting the prediction that touch plays an important prerequisite role in musical interaction between the mother and child. Our study provides important insight into the role of music as a tool in displaying the intent between or within groups to strengthen potentially conflict-free alliances during joint foraging activities.

Nocturnal selective pressures on the evolution of human musicality as a missing piece of the adaptationist puzzle

Human musicality exhibits the necessary hallmarks for biological adaptations. Evolutionary explanations focus on recurrent adaptive problems that human musicality possibly solved in ancestral environments, such as mate selection and competition, social bonding/cohesion and social grooming, perceptual and motor skill development, conflict reduction, safe time-passing, transgenerational communication, mood regulation and synchronization, and credible signaling of coalition and territorial/predator defense. Although not mutually exclusive, these different hypotheses are still not conceptually integrated nor clearly derived from independent principles. I propose The Nocturnal Evolution of Human Musicality and Performativity Theory in which the night-time is the missing piece of the adaptationist puzzle of human musicality and performing arts. The expansion of nocturnal activities throughout human evolution, which is tied to tree-to-ground sleep transition and habitual use of fire, might help (i) explain the evolution of musicality from independent principles, (ii) explain various seemingly unrelated music features and functions, and (iii) integrate many ancestral adaptive values proposed. The expansion into the nocturnal niche posed recurrent ancestral adaptive challenges/opportunities: lack of luminosity, regrouping to cook before sleep, imminent dangerousness, low temperatures, peak tiredness, and concealment of identity. These crucial night-time features might have selected evening-oriented individuals who were prone to acoustic communication, more alert and imaginative, gregarious, risk-taking and novelty-seeking, prone to anxiety modulation, hedonistic, promiscuous, and disinhibited. Those night-time selected dispositions may have converged and enhanced protomusicality into human musicality by facilitating it to assume many survival- and reproduction-enhancing roles (social cohesion and coordination, signaling of coalitions, territorial defense, antipredatorial defense, knowledge transference, safe passage of time, children lullabies, and sexual selection) that are correspondent to the co-occurring night-time adaptive challenges/opportunities. The nocturnal dynamic may help explain musical features (sound, loudness, repetitiveness, call and response, song, elaboration/virtuosity, and duetting/chorusing). Across vertebrates, acoustic communication mostly occurs in nocturnal species. The eveningness chronotype is common among musicians and composers. Adolescents, who are the most evening-oriented humans, enjoy more music. Contemporary tribal nocturnal activities around the campfire involve eating, singing/dancing, storytelling, and rituals. I discuss the nocturnal integration of musicality's many roles and conclude that musicality is probably a multifunctional mental adaptation that evolved along with the night-time adaptive landscape.