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Passmore S, Wood ALC, Barbieri C, Shilton D, Daikoku H, Atkinson QD, Savage PE. Global musical diversity is largely independent of linguistic and genetic histories. Nat Commun 2024; 15:3964. [PMID: 38729968 PMCID: PMC11087526 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-48113-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/28/2023] [Accepted: 04/19/2024] [Indexed: 05/12/2024] Open
Abstract
Music is a universal yet diverse cultural trait transmitted between generations. The extent to which global musical diversity traces cultural and demographic history, however, is unresolved. Using a global musical dataset of 5242 songs from 719 societies, we identify five axes of musical diversity and show that music contains geographical and historical structures analogous to linguistic and genetic diversity. After creating a matched dataset of musical, genetic, and linguistic data spanning 121 societies containing 981 songs, 1296 individual genetic profiles, and 121 languages, we show that global musical similarities are only weakly and inconsistently related to linguistic or genetic histories, with some regional exceptions such as within Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. Our results suggest that global musical traditions are largely distinct from some non-musical aspects of human history.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sam Passmore
- Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, Fujisawa, Japan.
- Evolution of Cultural Diversity Initiative (ECDI), Australian National University, Canberra, Australia.
| | | | - Chiara Barbieri
- Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich, Zurich, 8057, Switzerland
- Centre for the Interdisciplinary Study of Language Evolution (ISLE), University of Zurich, Zurich, 8050, Switzerland
- Department of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Cagliari, 09126, Cagliari, Italy
| | - Dor Shilton
- Cohn Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Ideas, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel
- Edelstein Centre for the History and Philosophy of Science, Technology, and Medicine, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
| | - Hideo Daikoku
- Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, Fujisawa, Japan
| | | | - Patrick E Savage
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.
- Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University, Fujisawa, Japan.
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2
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Claessens S, Kyritsis T, Atkinson QD. Cross-national analyses require additional controls to account for the non-independence of nations. Nat Commun 2023; 14:5776. [PMID: 37723194 PMCID: PMC10507061 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-41486-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/02/2022] [Accepted: 09/06/2023] [Indexed: 09/20/2023] Open
Abstract
Cross-national analyses test hypotheses about the drivers of variation in national outcomes. However, since nations are connected in various ways, such as via spatial proximity and shared cultural ancestry, cross-national analyses often violate assumptions of non-independence, inflating false positive rates. Here, we show that, despite being recognised as an important statistical pitfall for over 200 years, cross-national research in economics and psychology still does not sufficiently account for non-independence. In a review of the 100 highest-cited cross-national studies of economic development and values, we find that controls for non-independence are rare. When studies do control for non-independence, our simulations suggest that most commonly used methods are insufficient for reducing false positives in non-independent data. In reanalyses of twelve previous cross-national correlations, half of the estimates are compatible with no association after controlling for non-independence using global proximity matrices. We urge social scientists to sufficiently control for non-independence in cross-national research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Scott Claessens
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.
| | - Thanos Kyritsis
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.
- School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom.
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3
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Yurdum L, Singh M, Glowacki L, Vardy T, Atkinson QD, Hilton CB, Sauter D, Krasnow MM, Mehr SA. Universal interpretations of vocal music. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2023; 120:e2218593120. [PMID: 37676911 PMCID: PMC10500275 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2218593120] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/31/2022] [Accepted: 06/21/2023] [Indexed: 09/09/2023] Open
Abstract
Despite the variability of music across cultures, some types of human songs share acoustic characteristics. For example, dance songs tend to be loud and rhythmic, and lullabies tend to be quiet and melodious. Human perceptual sensitivity to the behavioral contexts of songs, based on these musical features, suggests that basic properties of music are mutually intelligible, independent of linguistic or cultural content. Whether these effects reflect universal interpretations of vocal music, however, is unclear because prior studies focus almost exclusively on English-speaking participants, a group that is not representative of humans. Here, we report shared intuitions concerning the behavioral contexts of unfamiliar songs produced in unfamiliar languages, in participants living in Internet-connected industrialized societies (n = 5,516 native speakers of 28 languages) or smaller-scale societies with limited access to global media (n = 116 native speakers of three non-English languages). Participants listened to songs randomly selected from a representative sample of human vocal music, originally used in four behavioral contexts, and rated the degree to which they believed the song was used for each context. Listeners in both industrialized and smaller-scale societies inferred the contexts of dance songs, lullabies, and healing songs, but not love songs. Within and across cohorts, inferences were mutually consistent. Further, increased linguistic or geographical proximity between listeners and singers only minimally increased the accuracy of the inferences. These results demonstrate that the behavioral contexts of three common forms of music are mutually intelligible cross-culturally and imply that musical diversity, shaped by cultural evolution, is nonetheless grounded in some universal perceptual phenomena.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lidya Yurdum
- Child Study Center, Yale University, New Haven, CT06520
- Department of Psychology, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam1018WT, Netherlands
| | - Manvir Singh
- Department of Anthropology, University of California, Davis, DavisCA95616
| | - Luke Glowacki
- Department of Anthropology, Boston University, Boston, MA02215
| | - Thomas Vardy
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland1010, New Zealand
| | | | | | - Disa Sauter
- Department of Psychology, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam1018WT, Netherlands
| | - Max M. Krasnow
- Division of Continuing Education, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA02138
| | - Samuel A. Mehr
- Child Study Center, Yale University, New Haven, CT06520
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland1010, New Zealand
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4
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Heggarty P, Anderson C, Scarborough M, King B, Bouckaert R, Jocz L, Kümmel MJ, Jügel T, Irslinger B, Pooth R, Liljegren H, Strand RF, Haig G, Macák M, Kim RI, Anonby E, Pronk T, Belyaev O, Dewey-Findell TK, Boutilier M, Freiberg C, Tegethoff R, Serangeli M, Liosis N, Stroński K, Schulte K, Gupta GK, Haak W, Krause J, Atkinson QD, Greenhill SJ, Kühnert D, Gray RD. Language trees with sampled ancestors support a hybrid model for the origin of Indo-European languages. Science 2023; 381:eabg0818. [PMID: 37499002 DOI: 10.1126/science.abg0818] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/27/2021] [Accepted: 06/08/2023] [Indexed: 07/29/2023]
Abstract
The origins of the Indo-European language family are hotly disputed. Bayesian phylogenetic analyses of core vocabulary have produced conflicting results, with some supporting a farming expansion out of Anatolia ~9000 years before present (yr B.P.), while others support a spread with horse-based pastoralism out of the Pontic-Caspian Steppe ~6000 yr B.P. Here we present an extensive database of Indo-European core vocabulary that eliminates past inconsistencies in cognate coding. Ancestry-enabled phylogenetic analysis of this dataset indicates that few ancient languages are direct ancestors of modern clades and produces a root age of ~8120 yr B.P. for the family. Although this date is not consistent with the Steppe hypothesis, it does not rule out an initial homeland south of the Caucasus, with a subsequent branch northward onto the steppe and then across Europe. We reconcile this hybrid hypothesis with recently published ancient DNA evidence from the steppe and the northern Fertile Crescent.
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Affiliation(s)
- Paul Heggarty
- Departamento de Humanidades, Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, 15088 Lima, Peru
- Waves Group, Department of Human Behavior, Ecology and Culture, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
| | - Cormac Anderson
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
| | - Matthew Scarborough
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
- Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, University of Copenhagen, S 2300 København, Denmark
| | - Benedict King
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
| | - Remco Bouckaert
- Centre for Computational Evolution, University of Auckland, Auckland 1010, New Zealand
| | - Lechosław Jocz
- Faculty of Humanities, Jacob of Paradies University, 66-400 Gorzów Wielkopolski, Poland
| | - Martin Joachim Kümmel
- Seminar for Indo-European Studies, Institut für Orientalistik, Indogermanistik, Ur- und Frühgeschichtliche Archäologie, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, 07743 Jena, Germany
| | - Thomas Jügel
- Center for Religious Studies (CERES), Ruhr University Bochum, 44789 Bochum, Germany
| | - Britta Irslinger
- Saxon Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 04107 Leipzig, Germany
| | - Roland Pooth
- Department of Linguistics, Ghent University, 9000 Ghent, Belgium
| | - Henrik Liljegren
- Department of Linguistics, Stockholm University, 10691 Stockholm, Sweden
| | | | - Geoffrey Haig
- Department of General Linguistics, University of Bamberg, 96047 Bamberg, Germany
| | | | - Ronald I Kim
- Department of Older Germanic Languages, Faculty of English, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, 60-780 Poznań, Poland
| | - Erik Anonby
- School of Linguistics and Language Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON K1S 5B6, Canada
- Leiden University Centre for Linguistics, 2300 RA Leiden, Netherlands
| | - Tijmen Pronk
- Leiden University Centre for Linguistics, 2300 RA Leiden, Netherlands
| | - Oleg Belyaev
- Department of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, Lomonosov Moscow State University, 119991 GSP-1 Moscow, Russia
- Department of Iranian Languages, Institute of Linguistics RAS, Moscow 125009, Russia
| | - Tonya Kim Dewey-Findell
- Centre for the Study of the Viking Age, School of English, University of Nottingham NG7 2RD, UK
| | - Matthew Boutilier
- Department of German, Nordic, and Slavic, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI 53706, USA
| | - Cassandra Freiberg
- Institut für deutsche Sprache und Linguistik, Sprach- und literaturwissenschaftliche Fakultät, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, 10099 Berlin, Germany
| | - Robert Tegethoff
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
- Seminar for Indo-European Studies, Institut für Orientalistik, Indogermanistik, Ur- und Frühgeschichtliche Archäologie, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, 07743 Jena, Germany
| | - Matilde Serangeli
- Seminar for Indo-European Studies, Institut für Orientalistik, Indogermanistik, Ur- und Frühgeschichtliche Archäologie, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, 07743 Jena, Germany
| | - Nikos Liosis
- Institute of Modern Greek Studies, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, 54124 Thessaloniki, Greece
| | - Krzysztof Stroński
- Faculty of Modern Languages, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, 61-874 Poznań, Poland
| | - Kim Schulte
- Department of Translation and Communication, Jaume I University, 12006 Castelló de la Plana, Spain
| | - Ganesh Kumar Gupta
- Faculty of Modern Languages, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, 61-874 Poznań, Poland
| | - Wolfgang Haak
- Department of Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
| | - Johannes Krause
- Department of Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland 1010, New Zealand
- Centre for the Study of Social Cohesion, University of Oxford, Oxford OX2 6PN, UK
| | - Simon J Greenhill
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
- ARC Center of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 2600, Australia
| | - Denise Kühnert
- Transmission, Infection, Diversification and Evolution Group, Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, 07745 Jena, Germany
| | - Russell D Gray
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland 1010, New Zealand
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5
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Skirgård H, Haynie HJ, Blasi DE, Hammarström H, Collins J, Latarche JJ, Lesage J, Weber T, Witzlack-Makarevich A, Passmore S, Chira A, Maurits L, Dinnage R, Dunn M, Reesink G, Singer R, Bowern C, Epps P, Hill J, Vesakoski O, Robbeets M, Abbas NK, Auer D, Bakker NA, Barbos G, Borges RD, Danielsen S, Dorenbusch L, Dorn E, Elliott J, Falcone G, Fischer J, Ghanggo Ate Y, Gibson H, Göbel HP, Goodall JA, Gruner V, Harvey A, Hayes R, Heer L, Herrera Miranda RE, Hübler N, Huntington-Rainey B, Ivani JK, Johns M, Just E, Kashima E, Kipf C, Klingenberg JV, König N, Koti A, Kowalik RG, Krasnoukhova O, Lindvall NL, Lorenzen M, Lutzenberger H, Martins TR, Mata German C, van der Meer S, Montoya Samamé J, Müller M, Muradoglu S, Neely K, Nickel J, Norvik M, Oluoch CA, Peacock J, Pearey IO, Peck N, Petit S, Pieper S, Poblete M, Prestipino D, Raabe L, Raja A, Reimringer J, Rey SC, Rizaew J, Ruppert E, Salmon KK, Sammet J, Schembri R, Schlabbach L, Schmidt FW, Skilton A, Smith WD, de Sousa H, Sverredal K, Valle D, Vera J, Voß J, Witte T, Wu H, Yam S, Ye J, Yong M, Yuditha T, Zariquiey R, Forkel R, Evans N, Levinson SC, Haspelmath M, Greenhill SJ, Atkinson QD, Gray RD. Grambank reveals the importance of genealogical constraints on linguistic diversity and highlights the impact of language loss. Sci Adv 2023; 9:eadg6175. [PMID: 37075104 PMCID: PMC10115409 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adg6175] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/03/2023]
Abstract
While global patterns of human genetic diversity are increasingly well characterized, the diversity of human languages remains less systematically described. Here, we outline the Grambank database. With over 400,000 data points and 2400 languages, Grambank is the largest comparative grammatical database available. The comprehensiveness of Grambank allows us to quantify the relative effects of genealogical inheritance and geographic proximity on the structural diversity of the world's languages, evaluate constraints on linguistic diversity, and identify the world's most unusual languages. An analysis of the consequences of language loss reveals that the reduction in diversity will be strikingly uneven across the major linguistic regions of the world. Without sustained efforts to document and revitalize endangered languages, our linguistic window into human history, cognition, and culture will be seriously fragmented.
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Affiliation(s)
- Hedvig Skirgård
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Department of Linguistics, School of Culture, History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Department of Language and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- Corresponding author. (H.S.); (R.D.G.)
| | - Hannah J. Haynie
- Department of Linguistics, University of Colorado Boulder, Boulder, CO, USA
| | - Damián E. Blasi
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Department of Human Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
- Human Relation Area Files, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
| | - Harald Hammarström
- Department of Language and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- Department of Linguistics and Philology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Jeremy Collins
- Department of Language and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- Department of Linguistics, Faculty of Arts, Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands
| | - Jay J. Latarche
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Jakob Lesage
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Department of Language and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- Langage, Langues et Cultures d'Afrique (LLACAN), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Villejuif, France
- Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales (INALCO), Paris, France
- Department of Asian and African Studies, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Berlin, Germany
| | - Tobias Weber
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Alena Witzlack-Makarevich
- Department of Linguistics, Faculty of Humanities, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
| | - Sam Passmore
- Evolution of Cultural Diversity Initiative, School of Culture, History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia
- Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University SFC (Shonan Fujisawa Campus), Tokyo, Japan
- Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, Faculty of Arts, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK
| | - Angela Chira
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Luke Maurits
- Department of Comparative Cultural Psychology, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Russell Dinnage
- Department of Biological Sciences, Institute of Environment, Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA
| | - Michael Dunn
- Department of Language and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- Department of Linguistics and Philology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Ger Reesink
- Department of Linguistics, Faculty of Arts, Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands
| | - Ruth Singer
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Research Unit for Indigenous Language, School of Languages and Linguistics, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia
| | - Claire Bowern
- Department of Linguistics, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
| | - Patience Epps
- Department of Linguistics, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA
| | - Jane Hill
- School of Anthropology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA
| | - Outi Vesakoski
- Department of Biology, Turku University, Turku, Finland
- Department of Finnish and Finno-Ugric languages, University of Turku, Turku, Finland
| | - Martine Robbeets
- Department of Archaeology, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
| | - Noor Karolin Abbas
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Daniel Auer
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Nancy A. Bakker
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Giulia Barbos
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Robert D. Borges
- Institute of Slavic Studies, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
| | - Swintha Danielsen
- Zentrum für Kleine und Regionale Sprachen, Friesisches Seminar, Europa-Universität Flensburg, Flensburg, Germany
- Centro de Investigaciones Históricas y Antropológicas (CIHA), Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia
- Europa-Universität Flensburg (EUF), Flensburg, Germany
| | - Luise Dorenbusch
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Institute of Linguistics, Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Ella Dorn
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - John Elliott
- Department of Linguistics, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, Honolulu, HI, USA
| | - Giada Falcone
- Department of Linguistics and Philology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Jana Fischer
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Yustinus Ghanggo Ate
- Department of Linguistics, School of Culture, History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Universitas Katolik Weetebula, Sumba Island, Indonesia
| | - Hannah Gibson
- Department of Languages and Linguistics, University of Essex, Essex, UK
| | - Hans-Philipp Göbel
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
- Department of Linguistics, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
| | - Jemima A. Goodall
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Victoria Gruner
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Andrew Harvey
- Faculty of Languages and Literatures, University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany
| | - Rebekah Hayes
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Leonard Heer
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Roberto E. Herrera Miranda
- Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales (INALCO), Paris, France
- Institute of Linguistics, Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany
- Structure et Dynamique des Langues (SeDyl), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Villejuif, France
- Sprachwissenschaftliches Seminar, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
| | - Nataliia Hübler
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Biu Huntington-Rainey
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
- Division of Psychology and Language Sciences, Faculty of Brain Sciences, University College London (UCL), University of London, London, UK
- Institutt for Filosofi, ide- og Kunsthistorie og Klassiske Språk (IFIKK), Det Humanistisk Fakultet, Universitet i Oslo, Oslo, Norway
| | - Jessica K. Ivani
- Department of Comparative Linguistics, University of Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland
| | - Marilen Johns
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Erika Just
- Department of Comparative Linguistics, University of Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland
| | - Eri Kashima
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Department of Linguistics, School of Culture, History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Carolina Kipf
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Janina V. Klingenberg
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Nikita König
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
- Department of Linguistics, European University Viadrina, Frankfur an der Oder, Germany
| | - Aikaterina Koti
- Department of Linguistics and Philology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | | | - Olga Krasnoukhova
- Centre for Linguistics, Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands
- Department of Linguistics, University of Antwerpen, Antwerpen, Belgium
| | - Nora L. M. Lindvall
- Department of Linguistics and Philology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Mandy Lorenzen
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Hannah Lutzenberger
- Department of Linguistics, Faculty of Arts, Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- Department of English Language and Linguistics, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK
| | - Tânia R. A. Martins
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Celia Mata German
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Suzanne van der Meer
- Department of Language and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
| | - Jaime Montoya Samamé
- Facultad de Letras y Ciencias Humanas, Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, Lima, Perú
| | - Michael Müller
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Saliha Muradoglu
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Kelsey Neely
- Department of Linguistics, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA
| | - Johanna Nickel
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Miina Norvik
- Institute of Estonian and General Linguistics, University of Tartu, Tartu, Estonia
- Department of Modern Languages, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Cheryl Akinyi Oluoch
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Jesse Peacock
- Department of Language and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- Department of Linguistics, Faculty of Arts, Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands
| | - India O. C. Pearey
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Naomi Peck
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- University of Freiburg, Freiburg, Germany
| | - Stephanie Petit
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Sören Pieper
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Mariana Poblete
- Facultad de Letras y Ciencias Humanas, Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, Lima, Perú
- Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile
| | - Daniel Prestipino
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Linda Raabe
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Amna Raja
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Janis Reimringer
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Sydney C. Rey
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
- The Language Conservancy, Bloomington, IN, USA
| | - Julia Rizaew
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Eloisa Ruppert
- Department of Linguistics, Quantitative Lexicology and Variational Linguistics (QLVL), KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
| | - Kim K. Salmon
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Jill Sammet
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Rhiannon Schembri
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Division of Ecology and Evolution, Research School of Biology, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia
| | - Lars Schlabbach
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | | | - Amalia Skilton
- Department of Linguistics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA
| | | | - Hilário de Sousa
- Department of Language and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- Centre de Recherches Linguistiques sur l'Asie Orientale (CRLAO), École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), Aubervilliers, France
| | - Kristin Sverredal
- Department of Linguistics and Philology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Daniel Valle
- Department of Modern Languages, University of Mississippi, Oxford, MS, USA
| | - Javier Vera
- Facultad de Letras y Ciencias Humanas, Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, Lima, Perú
| | - Judith Voß
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Tim Witte
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Frisian and General Linguistics, Department of General Linguistics, Institute for Scandinavian Studies, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany
| | - Henry Wu
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- International College for Postgraduate Buddhist Studies, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Stephanie Yam
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Institute for General Linguistics, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, Münster, Germany
| | - Jingting Ye
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Department of Chinese Language and Literature, Fudan University, Shanghai, China
| | - Maisie Yong
- Department of Linguistics, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK
| | - Tessa Yuditha
- Department of Linguistics, Faculty of Arts, Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- Department of Spanish, Linguistics, and Theory of Literature (Linguistics), Faculty of Philology, University of Seville, Seville, Spain
| | - Roberto Zariquiey
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Facultad de Letras y Ciencias Humanas, Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, Lima, Perú
| | - Robert Forkel
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Nicholas Evans
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Department of Linguistics, School of Culture, History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Stephen C. Levinson
- Department of Language and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
| | - Martin Haspelmath
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Simon J. Greenhill
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | | | - Russell D. Gray
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
- Corresponding author. (H.S.); (R.D.G.)
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6
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Claessens S, Sibley CG, Chaudhuri A, Atkinson QD. Cooperative and conformist behavioural preferences predict the dual dimensions of political ideology. Sci Rep 2023; 13:4886. [PMID: 36966181 PMCID: PMC10039865 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-023-31721-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/05/2022] [Accepted: 03/16/2023] [Indexed: 03/27/2023] Open
Abstract
Decades of research suggest that our political differences are best captured by two dimensions of political ideology. The dual evolutionary framework of political ideology predicts that these dimensions should be related to variation in social preferences for cooperation and group conformity. Here, we combine data from a New Zealand survey and a suite of incentivised behavioural tasks (n = 991) to test whether cooperative and conformist preferences covary with a pair of widely used measures of the two dimensions of political ideology-Social Dominance Orientation (SDO) and Right Wing Authoritarianism (RWA)-and related policy views. As predicted, we find that cooperative behaviour is negatively related to SDO and economically conservative policy views, while conformist behaviour in the form of social information use is positively related to RWA and socially conservative policy views. However, we did not find the predicted relationships between punitive and rule following behaviours and RWA or socially conservative views, raising questions about the interpretation of punishment and rule following tasks and the nature of authoritarian conformist preferences. These findings reveal how cooperative and conformist preferences that evolved to help us navigate social challenges in our ancestral past continue to track our political differences even today.
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Affiliation(s)
- Scott Claessens
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Floor 2, Building 302, 23 Symonds Street, Auckland, 1010, New Zealand
| | - Chris G Sibley
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Floor 2, Building 302, 23 Symonds Street, Auckland, 1010, New Zealand
| | - Ananish Chaudhuri
- Department of Economics, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
- CESifo, Munich, Germany
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Floor 2, Building 302, 23 Symonds Street, Auckland, 1010, New Zealand.
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7
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Sheehan O, Watts J, Gray RD, Bulbulia J, Claessens S, Ringen EJ, Atkinson QD. Coevolution of religious and political authority in Austronesian societies. Nat Hum Behav 2023; 7:38-45. [PMID: 36357777 PMCID: PMC9883158 DOI: 10.1038/s41562-022-01471-y] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/14/2020] [Accepted: 09/22/2022] [Indexed: 11/12/2022]
Abstract
Authority, an institutionalized form of social power, is one of the defining features of the large-scale societies that evolved during the Holocene. Religious and political authority have deep histories in human societies and are clearly interdependent, but the nature of their relationship and its evolution over time is contested. We purpose-built an ethnographic dataset of 97 Austronesian societies and used phylogenetic methods to address two long-standing questions about the evolution of religious and political authority: first, how these two institutions have coevolved, and second, whether religious and political authority have tended to become more or less differentiated. We found evidence for mutual interdependence between religious and political authority but no evidence for or against a long-term pattern of differentiation or unification in systems of religious and political authority. Our results provide insight into how political and religious authority have worked synergistically over millennia during the evolution of large-scale societies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Oliver Sheehan
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany.
| | - Joseph Watts
- grid.419518.00000 0001 2159 1813Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany ,grid.29980.3a0000 0004 1936 7830Religion Programme, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand ,grid.29980.3a0000 0004 1936 7830Centre for Research on Evolution, Belief, and Behaviour, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand
| | - Russell D. Gray
- grid.419518.00000 0001 2159 1813Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany ,grid.9654.e0000 0004 0372 3343School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Joseph Bulbulia
- grid.9654.e0000 0004 0372 3343School of Humanities, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand ,grid.267827.e0000 0001 2292 3111School of Psychology, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand
| | - Scott Claessens
- grid.9654.e0000 0004 0372 3343School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Erik J. Ringen
- grid.189967.80000 0001 0941 6502Department of Anthropology, Emory University, Atlanta, GA USA
| | - Quentin D. Atkinson
- grid.419518.00000 0001 2159 1813Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany ,grid.9654.e0000 0004 0372 3343School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
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8
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Kyritsis T, Matthews LJ, Welch D, Atkinson QD. Shared cultural ancestry predicts the global diffusion of democracy. Evol Hum Sci 2022; 4:e42. [PMID: 37588939 PMCID: PMC10426017 DOI: 10.1017/ehs.2022.40] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/29/2021] [Revised: 07/07/2022] [Accepted: 08/17/2022] [Indexed: 11/07/2022] Open
Abstract
Understanding global variation in democratic outcomes is critical to efforts to promote and sustain democracy today. Here, we use data on the democratic status of 221 modern and historical nations stretching back up to 200 years to show that, particularly over the last 50 years, nations with shared linguistic and, more recently, religious ancestry have more similar democratic outcomes. We also find evidence that for most of the last 50 years the democratic trajectory of a nation can be predicted by the democratic status of its linguistic and, less clearly, religious relatives, years and even decades earlier. These results are broadly consistent across three democracy indicators (Polity 5, Vanhanen's Index of Democracy, and Freedom in the World) and are not explained by geographical proximity or current shared language or religion. Our findings suggest that deep cultural ancestry remains an important force shaping the fortunes of modern nations, at least in part because democratic norms, institutions, and the factors that support them are more likely to diffuse between close cultural relatives.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Luke J. Matthews
- RAND Corporation, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
- Faculty, Pardee RAND Graduate School, Santa Monica, California, USA
| | - David Welch
- Centre for Computational Evolution, University of Auckland, New Zealand
- School of Computer Science, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
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9
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Savage PE, Passmore S, Chiba G, Currie TE, Suzuki H, Atkinson QD. Sequence alignment of folk song melodies reveals cross-cultural regularities of musical evolution. Curr Biol 2022; 32:1395-1402.e8. [PMID: 35120658 DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2022.01.039] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/01/2021] [Revised: 09/07/2021] [Accepted: 01/13/2022] [Indexed: 01/18/2023]
Abstract
Culture evolves,1-5 but the existence of cross-culturally general regularities of cultural evolution is debated.6-8 As a diverse but universal cultural phenomenon, music provides a novel domain to test for the existence of such regularities.9-12 Folk song melodies can be thought of as culturally transmitted sequences of notes that change over time under the influence of cognitive and acoustic/physical constraints.9-15 Modeling melodies as evolving sequences constructed from an "alphabet" of 12 scale degrees16 allows us to quantitatively test for the presence of cross-cultural regularities using a sample of 10,062 melodies from musically divergent Japanese and English (British/American) folk song traditions.17,18 Our analysis identifies 328 pairs of highly related melodies, finding that note changes are more likely when they have smaller impacts on a song's melody. Specifically, (1) notes with stronger rhythmic functions are less likely to change, and (2) note substitutions are most likely between neighboring notes. We also find that note insertions/deletions ("indels") are more common than note substitutions, unlike genetic evolution where the reverse is true. Our results are consistent across English and Japanese samples despite major differences in their scales and tonal systems. These findings demonstrate that even a creative art form such as music is subject to evolutionary constraints analogous to those governing the evolution of genes, languages, and other domains of culture.
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Affiliation(s)
- Patrick E Savage
- Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University, Shonan Fujisawa Campus, Endo, Fujisawa, Kanagawa 252-0882, Japan; School of Anthropology and Museum Archaeology, University of Oxford, Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 6PE, UK; Department of Musicology, Tokyo University of the Arts, Uenokoen, Taito, Tokyo 110-8714, Japan.
| | - Sam Passmore
- Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University, Shonan Fujisawa Campus, Endo, Fujisawa, Kanagawa 252-0882, Japan
| | - Gakuto Chiba
- Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University, Shonan Fujisawa Campus, Endo, Fujisawa, Kanagawa 252-0882, Japan
| | - Thomas E Currie
- Centre for Ecology & Conservation, College of Life & Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Penryn Campus, Cornwall TR10 9FE, UK
| | - Haruo Suzuki
- Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University, Shonan Fujisawa Campus, Endo, Fujisawa, Kanagawa 252-0882, Japan
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Symonds Street, Auckland 1010, New Zealand
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10
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Abstract
In the face of a slow and inadequate global response to anthropogenic climate change, scholars and journalists frequently claim that human psychology is not designed or evolved to solve the problem, and they highlight a range of "psychological barriers" to climate action. Here, we critically examine this claim and the evidence on which it is based. We identify four key problems with attributing climate inaction to "human nature" or evolved psychological barriers: (a) It minimizes variability within and between populations; (b) it oversimplifies psychological research and its implications for policy; (c) it frames responsibility for climate change in terms of the individual at the expense of the role of other aspects of culture, including institutional actors; and (d) it rationalizes inaction. For these reasons, the message from social scientists must be clear-humans' current collective failure to tackle climate change on the scale required cannot be explained as a product of a universal and fixed human nature because it is a fundamentally cultural phenomenon, reflecting culturally evolved values, norms, institutions, and technologies that can and must change rapidly.
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11
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Slingerland E, Atkinson QD, Ember CR, Sheehan O, Muthukrishna M, Bulbulia J, Gray RD. Coding culture: challenges and recommendations for comparative cultural databases. Evol Hum Sci 2020; 2:e29. [PMID: 37588354 PMCID: PMC10427479 DOI: 10.1017/ehs.2020.30] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/06/2022] Open
Abstract
Considerable progress in explaining cultural evolutionary dynamics has been made by applying rigorous models from the natural sciences to historical and ethnographic information collected and accessed using novel digital platforms. Initial results have clarified several long-standing debates in cultural evolutionary studies, such as population origins, the role of religion in the evolution of complex societies and the factors that shape global patterns of language diversity. However, future progress requires recognition of the unique challenges posed by cultural data. To address these challenges, standards for data collection, organisation and analysis must be improved and widely adopted. Here, we describe some major challenges to progress in the construction of large comparative databases of cultural history, including recognising the critical role of theory, selecting appropriate units of analysis, data gathering and sampling strategies, winning expert buy-in, achieving reliability and reproducibility in coding, and ensuring interoperability and sustainability of the resulting databases. We conclude by proposing a set of practical guidelines to meet these challenges.
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Affiliation(s)
- Edward Slingerland
- Department of Asian Studies, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
| | | | - Carol R. Ember
- Human Relations Area Files, Yale University, New Haven, USA
| | - Oliver Sheehan
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Michael Muthukrishna
- Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science, London School of Economics, London, UK
| | - Joseph Bulbulia
- School of Humanities, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Russell D. Gray
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
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12
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Claessens S, Fischer K, Chaudhuri A, Sibley CG, Atkinson QD. The dual evolutionary foundations of political ideology. Nat Hum Behav 2020; 4:336-345. [PMID: 32231279 DOI: 10.1038/s41562-020-0850-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 41] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/17/2019] [Accepted: 03/03/2020] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Abstract
Research over the last fifty years has suggested that political attitudes and values around the globe are shaped by two ideological dimensions, often referred to as economic and social conservatism. However, it remains unclear why this ideological structure exists. Here we highlight the striking concordance between these dual dimensions of ideology and independent convergent evidence for two key shifts in the evolution of human group living. First, humans began to cooperate more and across wider interdependent networks. Second, humans became more group-minded, conforming to social norms in culturally marked groups and punishing norm-violators. We propose that fitness trade-offs and behavioural plasticity have maintained functional variation in willingness to cooperate and conform within modern human groups, naturally giving rise to the two dimensions of political ideology. Supported by evidence from across the behavioural sciences, this evolutionary framework provides insight into the biological and cultural basis of political ideology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Scott Claessens
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Kyle Fischer
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Ananish Chaudhuri
- Department of Economics, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.,CESifo, Munich, Germany
| | - Chris G Sibley
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand. .,Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany.
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13
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Lang M, Purzycki BG, Apicella CL, Atkinson QD, Bolyanatz A, Cohen E, Handley C, Kundtová Klocová E, Lesorogol C, Mathew S, McNamara RA, Moya C, Placek CD, Soler M, Vardy T, Weigel JL, Willard AK, Xygalatas D, Norenzayan A, Henrich J. Moralizing gods, impartiality and religious parochialism across 15 societies. Proc Biol Sci 2020; 286:20190202. [PMID: 30836871 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2019.0202] [Citation(s) in RCA: 32] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
The emergence of large-scale cooperation during the Holocene remains a central problem in the evolutionary literature. One hypothesis points to culturally evolved beliefs in punishing, interventionist gods that facilitate the extension of cooperative behaviour toward geographically distant co-religionists. Furthermore, another hypothesis points to such mechanisms being constrained to the religious ingroup, possibly at the expense of religious outgroups. To test these hypotheses, we administered two behavioural experiments and a set of interviews to a sample of 2228 participants from 15 diverse populations. These populations included foragers, pastoralists, horticulturalists, and wage labourers, practicing Buddhism, Christianity, and Hinduism, but also forms of animism and ancestor worship. Using the Random Allocation Game (RAG) and the Dictator Game (DG) in which individuals allocated money between themselves, local and geographically distant co-religionists, and religious outgroups, we found that higher ratings of gods as monitoring and punishing predicted decreased local favouritism (RAGs) and increased resource-sharing with distant co-religionists (DGs). The effects of punishing and monitoring gods on outgroup allocations revealed between-site variability, suggesting that in the absence of intergroup hostility, moralizing gods may be implicated in cooperative behaviour toward outgroups. These results provide support for the hypothesis that beliefs in monitoring and punitive gods help expand the circle of sustainable social interaction, and open questions about the treatment of religious outgroups.
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Affiliation(s)
- Martin Lang
- 1 Department of Human Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University , Cambridge, MA 02138 , USA.,2 LEVYNA: Laboratory for the Experimental Research of Religion, Masaryk University , Brno 602 00 , Czech Republic
| | - Benjamin G Purzycki
- 3 Department of Human Behavior, Ecology and Culture, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology , Leipzig 04103 , Germany
| | - Coren L Apicella
- 4 Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania , Philadelphia, PA 6241 , USA
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- 5 Department of Psychology, University of Auckland , Auckland , New Zealand.,6 Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History , Jena 07745 , Germany
| | - Alexander Bolyanatz
- 7 Social Science Sub-Division, College of DuPage , Glen Ellyn, IL 60137 , USA
| | - Emma Cohen
- 8 School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography, University of Oxford , Oxford OX2 6PE , UK.,9 Wadham College, University of Oxford , Oxford OX2 6PE , UK
| | - Carla Handley
- 10 Institute of Human Origins, Arizona State University , Tempe, AZ 4101 , USA
| | - Eva Kundtová Klocová
- 2 LEVYNA: Laboratory for the Experimental Research of Religion, Masaryk University , Brno 602 00 , Czech Republic
| | - Carolyn Lesorogol
- 11 Department of Anthropology, Washington University in St. Louis , St. Louis, MO 63130 , USA
| | - Sarah Mathew
- 10 Institute of Human Origins, Arizona State University , Tempe, AZ 4101 , USA
| | - Rita A McNamara
- 12 School of Psychology, Victoria University of Wellington , Wellington 6140 , New Zealand
| | - Cristina Moya
- 13 Department of Anthropology, University of California-Davis , Davis, CA 95616 , USA
| | - Caitlyn D Placek
- 14 Department of Anthropology, Ball State University , Muncie, IN 47306 , USA
| | - Montserrat Soler
- 15 Department of Anthropology, Montclair State University , Montclair, NJ 07043 , USA
| | - Thomas Vardy
- 5 Department of Psychology, University of Auckland , Auckland , New Zealand
| | - Jonathan L Weigel
- 16 Department of Economics and Government, Harvard University , Cambridge, MA 02138 , USA
| | - Aiyana K Willard
- 17 Centre for Culture and Evolution, Brunel University London , Middlesex UB8 3PH , UK
| | - Dimitris Xygalatas
- 18 Department of Anthropology, University of Connecticut , Storrs, CT 06269 , USA
| | - Ara Norenzayan
- 19 Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia , Vancouver, BC, Canada V6T 1Z4
| | - Joseph Henrich
- 1 Department of Human Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University , Cambridge, MA 02138 , USA
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14
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Ruck DJ, Matthews LJ, Kyritsis T, Atkinson QD, Bentley RA. The cultural foundations of modern democracies. Nat Hum Behav 2019; 4:265-269. [PMID: 31792400 DOI: 10.1038/s41562-019-0769-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/24/2019] [Accepted: 10/09/2019] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Abstract
National democracy is a rare thing in human history and its stability has long been tied to the cultural values of citizens. Yet it has not been established whether changing cultural values made modern democracy possible or whether those values were a response to democratic institutions. Here we combine longitudinal data and cohort information of nearly 500,000 individuals from 109 nations to track the co-evolution of democratic values and institutions over the last century. We find that cultural values of openness towards diversity predict a shift towards democracy and that nations with low institutional confidence are prone to political instability. In addition, the presence of democratic institutions did not predict any substantive changes in the measured cultural values. These results hold accounting for other factors, including gross domestic product per capita and non-independence between nations due to shared cultural ancestry. Cultural values lead to, rather than follow, the emergence of democracy. This indicates that current stable democracies will be under threat, should cultural values of openness to diversity and institutional confidence substantially decline.
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Affiliation(s)
- Damian J Ruck
- Department of Anthropology, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA. .,Center for the Dynamics of Social Complexity, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA. .,College of Communication and Information, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA.
| | | | - Thanos Kyritsis
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.,Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
| | - R Alexander Bentley
- Department of Anthropology, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA.,Center for the Dynamics of Social Complexity, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA
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15
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Vardy T, Atkinson QD. Property Damage and Exposure to Other People in Distress Differentially Predict Prosocial Behavior After a Natural Disaster. Psychol Sci 2019; 30:563-575. [DOI: 10.1177/0956797619826972] [Citation(s) in RCA: 18] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/02/2023] Open
Abstract
The persistent threat of natural disasters and their attendant resource shocks has likely shaped our prosocial drives throughout human evolution. However, it remains unclear how specific experiences during these events might impact cooperative decision making. We conducted two waves of four modified dictator-game experiments with the same individuals in Vanuatu ( N = 164), before and after Cyclone Pam in 2015. After the cyclone, participants were generally less likely to show prosocial motives toward both in-group and out-group members and more likely to show parochialism when sharing between groups. Experiencing greater property damage predicted a general decrease in prosocial allocations and preference for participants’ in-group. By contrast, exposure to other people in distress predicted increased prosocial allocations to both participants’ in-group and out-groups. Our results suggest that people adjust their prosocial behavior in response to natural disasters but that the nature and direction of the effect depend on the type and severity of their experiences.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tom Vardy
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland
| | - Quentin D. Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
- Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford
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16
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Watts J, Sheehan O, Bulbulia J, Gray RD, Atkinson QD. Christianity spread faster in small, politically structured societies. Nat Hum Behav 2018; 2:559-564. [DOI: 10.1038/s41562-018-0379-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/22/2017] [Accepted: 06/18/2018] [Indexed: 12/27/2022]
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17
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Sookias RB, Passmore S, Atkinson QD. Deep cultural ancestry and human development indicators across nation states. R Soc Open Sci 2018; 5:171411. [PMID: 29765628 PMCID: PMC5936893 DOI: 10.1098/rsos.171411] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/18/2017] [Accepted: 03/13/2018] [Indexed: 06/08/2023]
Abstract
How historical connections, events and cultural proximity can influence human development is being increasingly recognized. One aspect of history that has only recently begun to be examined is deep cultural ancestry, i.e. the vertical relationships of descent between cultures, which can be represented by a phylogenetic tree of descent. Here, we test whether deep cultural ancestry predicts the United Nations Human Development Index (HDI) for 44 Eurasian countries, using language ancestry as a proxy for cultural relatedness and controlling for three additional factors-geographical proximity, religion and former communism. While cultural ancestry alone predicts HDI and its subcomponents (income, health and education indices), when geographical proximity is included only income and health indices remain significant and the effect is small. When communism and religion variables are included, cultural ancestry is no longer a significant predictor; communism significantly negatively predicts HDI, income and health indices, and Muslim percentage of the population significantly negatively predicts education index, although the latter result may not be robust. These findings indicate that geographical proximity and recent cultural history-especially communism-are more important than deep cultural factors in current human development and suggest the efficacy of modern policy initiatives is not tightly constrained by cultural ancestry.
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Affiliation(s)
- Roland B. Sookias
- Museum für Naturkunde, Leibniz Institute for Evolution and Biodiversity Science, Invalidenstraße 43, 10115 Berlin, Germany
| | - Samuel Passmore
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1142, New Zealand
- Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Bristol, 43 Woodland Road, Bristol BS8 1UU, UK
| | - Quentin D. Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1142, New Zealand
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
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18
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Maurits L, Forkel R, Kaiping GA, Atkinson QD. BEASTling: A software tool for linguistic phylogenetics using BEAST 2. PLoS One 2017; 12:e0180908. [PMID: 28796784 PMCID: PMC5552126 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0180908] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/11/2017] [Accepted: 06/22/2017] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
We present a new open source software tool called BEASTling, designed to simplify the preparation of Bayesian phylogenetic analyses of linguistic data using the BEAST 2 platform. BEASTling transforms comparatively short and human-readable configuration files into the XML files used by BEAST to specify analyses. By taking advantage of Creative Commons-licensed data from the Glottolog language catalog, BEASTling allows the user to conveniently filter datasets using names for recognised language families, to impose monophyly constraints so that inferred language trees are backward compatible with Glottolog classifications, or to assign geographic location data to languages for phylogeographic analyses. Support for the emerging cross-linguistic linked data format (CLDF) permits easy incorporation of data published in cross-linguistic linked databases into analyses. BEASTling is intended to make the power of Bayesian analysis more accessible to historical linguists without strong programming backgrounds, in the hopes of encouraging communication and collaboration between those developing computational models of language evolution (who are typically not linguists) and relevant domain experts.
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Affiliation(s)
- Luke Maurits
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Robert Forkel
- Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
| | - Gereon A Kaiping
- Leiden University Centre for Linguistics, Leiden University, Leiden, the Netherlands
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.,Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
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19
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Purzycki BG, Apicella C, Atkinson QD, Cohen E, McNamara RA, Willard AK, Xygalatas D, Norenzayan A, Henrich J. Cross-cultural dataset for the evolution of religion and morality project. Sci Data 2016; 3:160099. [PMID: 27824332 PMCID: PMC5100682 DOI: 10.1038/sdata.2016.99] [Citation(s) in RCA: 74] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/19/2016] [Accepted: 09/29/2016] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
A considerable body of research cross-culturally examines the evolution of religious traditions, beliefs and behaviors. The bulk of this research, however, draws from coded qualitative ethnographies rather than from standardized methods specifically designed to measure religious beliefs and behaviors. Psychological data sets that examine religious thought and behavior in controlled conditions tend to be disproportionately sampled from student populations. Some cross-national databases employ standardized methods at the individual level, but are primarily focused on fully market integrated, state-level societies. The Evolution of Religion and Morality Project sought to generate a data set that systematically probed individual level measures sampling across a wider range of human populations. The set includes data from behavioral economic experiments and detailed surveys of demographics, religious beliefs and practices, material security, and intergroup perceptions. This paper describes the methods and variables, briefly introduces the sites and sampling techniques, notes inconsistencies across sites, and provides some basic reporting for the data set.
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Affiliation(s)
- Benjamin Grant Purzycki
- Department of Human Behavior, Ecology, and Culture, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Deutscher Platz 6, Leipzig 04103, Germany
| | - Coren Apicella
- Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, Solomon Laboratories, 3720 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-6241, USA
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Human Sciences Building-East, Level 5, Room 201E-523, 10 Symonds St, Auckland 1010, New Zealand.,Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Kahlaische Strasse 10, Jena D-07745, Germany
| | - Emma Cohen
- Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford, 64 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 6PN, UK
| | - Rita Anne McNamara
- Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia, 2136 West Mall, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada V6T 1Z4
| | - Aiyana K Willard
- Culture, and Development Laboratory, Department of Psychology, The University of Texas at Austin, 1 University Station #A8000, Austin, Texas 78712-0187, USA
| | - Dimitris Xygalatas
- Department of Anthropology, University of Connecticut, 354 Mansfield Road Unit 1176, Storrs, Connecticut 06029, USA.,Interacting Minds Centre, Aarhus University, Jens Chr. Skous Vej 4, build. 1483, Aarhus DK-8000, Denmark.,LEVYNA, Masaryk University, Brno 60200, Czech Republic
| | - Ara Norenzayan
- Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia, 2136 West Mall, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada V6T 1Z4
| | - Joseph Henrich
- Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia, 2136 West Mall, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada V6T 1Z4.,Department of Economics, University of British Columbia, 2136 West Mall, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada V6T 1Z4.,Department of Human Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, 11 Divinity Ave, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA
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20
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Saunders TJ, Taylor AH, Atkinson QD. No evidence that a range of artificial monitoring cues influence online donations to charity in an MTurk sample. R Soc Open Sci 2016; 3:150710. [PMID: 27853533 PMCID: PMC5098958 DOI: 10.1098/rsos.150710] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/22/2015] [Accepted: 09/13/2016] [Indexed: 05/19/2023]
Abstract
Monitoring cues, such as an image of a face or pair of eyes, have been found to increase prosocial behaviour in several studies. However, other studies have found little or no support for this effect. Here, we examined whether monitoring cues affect online donations to charity while manipulating the emotion displayed, the number of watchers and the cue type. We also include as statistical controls a range of likely covariates of prosocial behaviour. Using the crowdsourcing Internet marketplace, Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk), 1535 participants completed our survey and were given the opportunity to donate to charity while being shown an image prime. None of the monitoring primes we tested had a significant effect on charitable giving. By contrast, the control variables of culture, age, sex and previous charity giving frequency did predict donations. This work supports the importance of cultural differences and enduring individual differences in prosocial behaviour and shows that a range of artificial monitoring cues do not reliably boost online charity donation on MTurk.
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21
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Atkinson QD, Coomber T, Passmore S, Greenhill SJ, Kushnick G. Cultural and Environmental Predictors of Pre-European Deforestation on Pacific Islands. PLoS One 2016; 11:e0156340. [PMID: 27232713 PMCID: PMC4883741 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0156340] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/25/2016] [Accepted: 05/12/2016] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
The varied islands of the Pacific provide an ideal natural experiment for studying the factors shaping human impact on the environment. Previous research into pre-European deforestation across the Pacific indicated a major effect of environment but did not account for cultural variation or control for dependencies in the data due to shared cultural ancestry and geographic proximity. The relative importance of environment and culture on Pacific deforestation and forest replacement and the extent to which environmental impact is constrained by cultural ancestry therefore remain unexplored. Here we use comparative phylogenetic methods to model the effect of nine ecological and two cultural variables on pre-European Pacific forest outcomes at 80 locations across 67 islands. We show that some but not all ecological features remain important predictors of forest outcomes after accounting for cultural covariates and non-independence in the data. Controlling for ecology, cultural variation in agricultural intensification predicts deforestation and forest replacement, and there is some evidence that land tenure norms predict forest replacement. These findings indicate that, alongside ecology, cultural factors also predict pre-European Pacific forest outcomes. Although forest outcomes covary with cultural ancestry, this effect disappears after controlling for geographic proximity and ecology. This suggests that forest outcomes were not tightly constrained by colonists' cultural ancestry, but instead reflect a combination of ecological constraints and the short-term responses of each culture in the face of those constraints.
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Affiliation(s)
- Quentin D. Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, 1142, New Zealand
- Max Planck Institute for History and the Sciences, Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745, Jena, Germany
- * E-mail:
| | - Ties Coomber
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, 1142, New Zealand
| | - Sam Passmore
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, 1142, New Zealand
| | - Simon J. Greenhill
- Max Planck Institute for History and the Sciences, Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745, Jena, Germany
- School of Culture, History and Language, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
- ARC Center of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
| | - Geoff Kushnick
- School of Archaeology and Anthropology, ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
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22
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Ross RM, Atkinson QD. Folktale transmission in the Arctic provides evidence for high bandwidth social learning among hunter–gatherer groups. EVOL HUM BEHAV 2016. [DOI: 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2015.08.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 21] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/16/2022]
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23
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Watts J, Greenhill SJ, Atkinson QD, Currie TE, Bulbulia J, Gray RD. Broad supernatural punishment but not moralizing high gods precede the evolution of political complexity in Austronesia. Proc Biol Sci 2015; 282:20142556. [PMID: 25740888 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2014.2556] [Citation(s) in RCA: 57] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Supernatural belief presents an explanatory challenge to evolutionary theorists-it is both costly and prevalent. One influential functional explanation claims that the imagined threat of supernatural punishment can suppress selfishness and enhance cooperation. Specifically, morally concerned supreme deities or 'moralizing high gods' have been argued to reduce free-riding in large social groups, enabling believers to build the kind of complex societies that define modern humanity. Previous cross-cultural studies claiming to support the MHG hypothesis rely on correlational analyses only and do not correct for the statistical non-independence of sampled cultures. Here we use a Bayesian phylogenetic approach with a sample of 96 Austronesian cultures to test the MHG hypothesis as well as an alternative supernatural punishment hypothesis that allows punishment by a broad range of moralizing agents. We find evidence that broad supernatural punishment drives political complexity, whereas MHGs follow political complexity. We suggest that the concept of MHGs diffused as part of a suite of traits arising from cultural exchange between complex societies. Our results show the power of phylogenetic methods to address long-standing debates about the origins and functions of religion in human society.
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Affiliation(s)
- Joseph Watts
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland 1142, New Zealand
| | - Simon J Greenhill
- School of Culture, History and Language, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland 1142, New Zealand Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Kahlaische Strasse 10, Jena 07745, Germany
| | - Thomas E Currie
- Department of Biosciences, College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Penryn Campus, Cornwall TR10 9EZ, UK
| | - Joseph Bulbulia
- School of Art History, Classics and Religious Studies, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington 6012, New Zealand
| | - Russell D Gray
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland 1142, New Zealand Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Kahlaische Strasse 10, Jena 07745, Germany Research School of the Social Sciences, Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory 0200, Australia Allan Wilson Centre for Molecular Ecology and Evolution, Palmerston North, New Zealand
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24
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Watts J, Sheehan O, Greenhill SJ, Gomes-Ng S, Atkinson QD, Bulbulia J, Gray RD. Pulotu: Database of Austronesian Supernatural Beliefs and Practices. PLoS One 2015; 10:e0136783. [PMID: 26398231 PMCID: PMC4580586 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0136783] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/13/2015] [Accepted: 08/07/2015] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Scholars have debated naturalistic theories of religion for thousands of years, but only recently have scientists begun to test predictions empirically. Existing databases contain few variables on religion, and are subject to Galton's Problem because they do not sufficiently account for the non-independence of cultures or systematically differentiate the traditional states of cultures from their contemporary states. Here we present Pulotu: the first quantitative cross-cultural database purpose-built to test evolutionary hypotheses of supernatural beliefs and practices. The Pulotu database documents the remarkable diversity of the Austronesian family of cultures, which originated in Taiwan, spread west to Madagascar and east to Easter Island-a region covering over half the world's longitude. The focus of Austronesian beliefs range from localised ancestral spirits to powerful creator gods. A wide range of practices also exist, such as headhunting, elaborate tattooing, and the construction of impressive monuments. Pulotu is freely available, currently contains 116 cultures, and has 80 variables describing supernatural beliefs and practices, as well as social and physical environments. One major advantage of Pulotu is that it has separate sections on the traditional states of cultures, the post-contact history of cultures, and the contemporary states of cultures. A second major advantage is that cultures are linked to a language-based family tree, enabling the use phylogenetic methods, which can be used to address Galton's Problem by accounting for common ancestry, to infer deep prehistory, and to model patterns of trait evolution over time. We illustrate the power of phylogenetic methods by performing an ancestral state reconstruction on the Pulotu variable "headhunting", finding evidence that headhunting was practiced in proto-Austronesian culture. Quantitative cross-cultural databases explicitly linking cultures to a phylogeny have the potential to revolutionise the field of comparative religious studies in the same way that genetic databases have revolutionised the field of evolutionary biology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Joseph Watts
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
- * E-mail:
| | - Oliver Sheehan
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
| | - Simon J. Greenhill
- School of Culture, History and Language, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
- ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
| | | | - Quentin D. Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
| | - Joseph Bulbulia
- School of Art History, Classics and Religious Studies, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand
| | - Russell D. Gray
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
- Research School of the Social Sciences, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Allan Wilson Centre for Molecular Ecology and Evolution, Palmerston North, New Zealand
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25
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Long J, Harré N, Atkinson QD. Erratum to: Understanding Change in Recycling and Littering Behavior Across a School Social Network. Am J Community Psychol 2015; 55:490. [PMID: 25758324 DOI: 10.1007/s10464-015-9706-2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/04/2023]
Affiliation(s)
- Jennifer Long
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, 1142, New Zealand
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26
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Abstract
Understanding how communities change requires examining how individuals' beliefs and behaviors are shaped by those around them. This paper investigates behavior change across a large social network following a recycling intervention in a New Zealand high school community. We used a mixed methods design, combining focus group data with social network analysis from two waves of a questionnaire that measured friendship networks; recycling and littering behaviors; perceived behavioral norms; and teacher, friend, and parent encouragement for these behaviors. Recycling behavior increased significantly over the course of our study. Supporting the importance of social networks in this context, both littering and recycling behavior showed clear social clustering. Further, the degree of change in an individuals' littering and recycling behavior across time was predicted by friends' prior behavior. Focus group data provided insight into students' perceptions of social interactions and how these contributed to littering and recycling behavior.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jennifer Long
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, 1142, New Zealand
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27
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Abstract
Despite a burgeoning science of cultural evolution, relatively little work has focused on the population structure of human cultural variation. By contrast, studies in human population genetics use a suite of tools to quantify and analyse spatial and temporal patterns of genetic variation within and between populations. Human genetic diversity can be explained largely as a result of migration and drift giving rise to gradual genetic clines, together with some discontinuities arising from geographical and cultural barriers to gene flow. Here, we adapt theory and methods from population genetics to quantify the influence of geography and ethnolinguistic boundaries on the distribution of 700 variants of a folktale in 31 European ethnolinguistic populations. We find that geographical distance and ethnolinguistic affiliation exert significant independent effects on folktale diversity and that variation between populations supports a clustering concordant with European geography. This pattern of geographical clines and clusters parallels the pattern of human genetic diversity in Europe, although the effects of geographical distance and ethnolinguistic boundaries are stronger for folktales than genes. Our findings highlight the importance of geography and population boundaries in models of human cultural variation and point to key similarities and differences between evolutionary processes operating on human genes and culture.
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Affiliation(s)
- Robert M Ross
- Department of Cognitive Science, ARC Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders, Macquarie University, Sydney, New South Wales 2109, Australia
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28
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Abstract
Unlike bones, behavior does not fossilize, so it is hard to infer the evolutionary history of social traits. However, we have shown elsewhere that Bayesian phylogenetic methods allow the investigation of ancestral states and models of evolution of social grouping behaviour in primates. Here, we extend this analysis to another significant aspect of primate social life, which may be subject to different evolutionary pressures—mating systems. We show that mating systems evolved from a polygynandrous state at the root of the phylogeny to the two derived states of harem-polygyny and monogamy. Unlike social organization, where there were no transitions from uni-male groups to pairs, here we found positive transition rates from both polygynous mating states into monogamy. There were no transitions out of monogamy to another mating state. Both derived mating systems evolved late in primate evolution. Nocturnal primates remained solitary foragers while their mating systems evolved from polygynandry to harem-polygyny and monogamy. However, among diurnal primates the derived mating states evolved at the same time as the derived states of social organization.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christopher Opie
- Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology; University of Oxford; Oxford, UK
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29
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Bouckaert R, Lemey P, Dunn M, Greenhill SJ, Alekseyenko AV, Drummond AJ, Gray RD, Suchard MA, Atkinson QD. Mapping the origins and expansion of the Indo-European language family. Science 2012; 337:957-60. [PMID: 22923579 DOI: 10.1126/science.1219669] [Citation(s) in RCA: 184] [Impact Index Per Article: 15.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/03/2022]
Abstract
There are two competing hypotheses for the origin of the Indo-European language family. The conventional view places the homeland in the Pontic steppes about 6000 years ago. An alternative hypothesis claims that the languages spread from Anatolia with the expansion of farming 8000 to 9500 years ago. We used Bayesian phylogeographic approaches, together with basic vocabulary data from 103 ancient and contemporary Indo-European languages, to explicitly model the expansion of the family and test these hypotheses. We found decisive support for an Anatolian origin over a steppe origin. Both the inferred timing and root location of the Indo-European language trees fit with an agricultural expansion from Anatolia beginning 8000 to 9500 years ago. These results highlight the critical role that phylogeographic inference can play in resolving debates about human prehistory.
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Affiliation(s)
- Remco Bouckaert
- Department of Computer Science, University of Auckland, Auckland 1142, New Zealand
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30
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Abstract
Jaeger
et al.
use statistical simulations to show that the serial founder effect analysis I reported has an inflated type 1 error rate. Crucially, however, their simulations also reveal that the strength of the observed relationship between phonemic diversity and distance from Africa is unlikely to be due to chance, even accounting for multiple comparisons and geographic clustering of phonemic diversity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Quentin D. Atkinson
- Department of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1142, New Zealand
- Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford, 64 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 6PN, UK
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31
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Affiliation(s)
- Quentin D. Atkinson
- Department of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1142, New Zealand
- Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford, 64 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 6PN, UK
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32
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Abstract
Historical inference is at its most powerful when independent lines of evidence can be integrated into a coherent account. Dating linguistic and cultural lineages can potentially play a vital role in the integration of evidence from linguistics, anthropology, archaeology and genetics. Unfortunately, although the comparative method in historical linguistics can provide a relative chronology, it cannot provide absolute date estimates and an alternative approach, called glottochronology, is fundamentally flawed. In this paper we outline how computational phylogenetic methods can reliably estimate language divergence dates and thus help resolve long-standing debates about human prehistory ranging from the origin of the Indo-European language family to the peopling of the Pacific.
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Affiliation(s)
- Russell D Gray
- Department of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.
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33
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Abstract
Human genetic and phenotypic diversity declines with distance from Africa, as predicted by a serial founder effect in which successive population bottlenecks during range expansion progressively reduce diversity, underpinning support for an African origin of modern humans. Recent work suggests that a similar founder effect may operate on human culture and language. Here I show that the number of phonemes used in a global sample of 504 languages is also clinal and fits a serial founder-effect model of expansion from an inferred origin in Africa. This result, which is not explained by more recent demographic history, local language diversity, or statistical non-independence within language families, points to parallel mechanisms shaping genetic and linguistic diversity and supports an African origin of modern human languages.
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Affiliation(s)
- Quentin D Atkinson
- Department of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, New Zealand.
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34
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35
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36
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Abstract
There are approximately 7000 languages spoken in the world today. This diversity reflects the legacy of thousands of years of cultural evolution. How far back we can trace this history depends largely on the rate at which the different components of language evolve. Rates of lexical evolution are widely thought to impose an upper limit of 6000-10,000 years on reliably identifying language relationships. In contrast, it has been argued that certain structural elements of language are much more stable. Just as biologists use highly conserved genes to uncover the deepest branches in the tree of life, highly stable linguistic features hold the promise of identifying deep relationships between the world's languages. Here, we present the first global network of languages based on this typological information. We evaluate the relative evolutionary rates of both typological and lexical features in the Austronesian and Indo-European language families. The first indications are that typological features evolve at similar rates to basic vocabulary but their evolution is substantially less tree-like. Our results suggest that, while rates of vocabulary change are correlated between the two language families, the rates of evolution of typological features and structural subtypes show no consistent relationship across families.
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Affiliation(s)
- S J Greenhill
- Department of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1042, New Zealand.
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37
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Atkinson QD, Barbujani G, Collard M, Comas D, Franceschi C. Interdisciplinary views on Molecular Anthropology in the Genomic Era. J Anthropol Sci 2010; 88:231-250. [PMID: 20834062] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [MESH Headings] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/29/2023]
Affiliation(s)
- Quentin D Atkinson
- Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford, Oxford, U.K.
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Atkinson QD, Gray RD, Drummond AJ. Bayesian coalescent inference of major human mitochondrial DNA haplogroup expansions in Africa. Proc Biol Sci 2009; 276:367-73. [PMID: 18826938 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2008.0785] [Citation(s) in RCA: 65] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Past population size can be estimated from modern genetic diversity using coalescent theory. Estimates of ancestral human population dynamics in sub-Saharan Africa can tell us about the timing and nature of our first steps towards colonizing the globe. Here, we combine Bayesian coalescent inference with a dataset of 224 complete human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequences to estimate effective population size through time for each of the four major African mtDNA haplogroups (L0-L3). We find evidence of three distinct demographic histories underlying the four haplogroups. Haplogroups L0 and L1 both show slow, steady exponential growth from 156 to 213kyr ago. By contrast, haplogroups L2 and L3 show evidence of substantial growth beginning 12-20 and 61-86kyr ago, respectively. These later expansions may be associated with contemporaneous environmental and/or cultural changes. The timing of the L3 expansion--8-12kyr prior to the emergence of the first non-African mtDNA lineages--together with high L3 diversity in eastern Africa, strongly supports the proposal that the human exodus from Africa and subsequent colonization of the globe was prefaced by a major expansion within Africa, perhaps driven by some form of cultural innovation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Quentin D Atkinson
- Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford, 64 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 6PN, UK.
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Abstract
Linguists speculate that human languages often evolve in rapid or punctuational bursts, sometimes associated with their emergence from other languages, but this phenomenon has never been demonstrated. We used vocabulary data from three of the world's major language groups-Bantu, Indo-European, and Austronesian-to show that 10 to 33% of the overall vocabulary differences among these languages arose from rapid bursts of change associated with language-splitting events. Our findings identify a general tendency for increased rates of linguistic evolution in fledgling languages, perhaps arising from a linguistic founder effect or a desire to establish a distinct social identity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Biological Sciences, University of Reading, Reading RG6 6AS, UK
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Atkinson QD, Gray RD, Drummond AJ. mtDNA variation predicts population size in humans and reveals a major Southern Asian chapter in human prehistory. Mol Biol Evol 2007; 25:468-74. [PMID: 18093996 DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msm277] [Citation(s) in RCA: 193] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
The relative timing and size of regional human population growth following our expansion from Africa remain unknown. Human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) diversity carries a legacy of our population history. Given a set of sequences, we can use coalescent theory to estimate past population size through time and draw inferences about human population history. However, recent work has challenged the validity of using mtDNA diversity to infer species population sizes. Here we use Bayesian coalescent inference methods, together with a global data set of 357 human mtDNA coding-region sequences, to infer human population sizes through time across 8 major geographic regions. Our estimates of relative population sizes show remarkable concordance with the contemporary regional distribution of humans across Africa, Eurasia, and the Americas, indicating that mtDNA diversity is a good predictor of population size in humans. Plots of population size through time show slow growth in sub-Saharan Africa beginning 143-193 kya, followed by a rapid expansion into Eurasia after the emergence of the first non-African mtDNA lineages 50-70 kya. Outside Africa, the earliest and fastest growth is inferred in Southern Asia approximately 52 kya, followed by a succession of growth phases in Northern and Central Asia (approximately 49 kya), Australia (approximately 48 kya), Europe (approximately 42 kya), the Middle East and North Africa (approximately 40 kya), New Guinea (approximately 39 kya), the Americas (approximately 18 kya), and a second expansion in Europe (approximately 10-15 kya). Comparisons of relative regional population sizes through time suggest that between approximately 45 and 20 kya most of humanity lived in Southern Asia. These findings not only support the use of mtDNA data for estimating human population size but also provide a unique picture of human prehistory and demonstrate the importance of Southern Asia to our recent evolutionary past.
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Affiliation(s)
- Quentin D Atkinson
- Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford, 58A Banbury Rd, Oxford, OX2 6QS, United Kingdom.
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Abstract
In The Descent of Man (1871), Darwin observed "curious parallels" between the processes of biological and linguistic evolution. These parallels mean that evolutionary biologists and historical linguists seek answers to similar questions and face similar problems. As a result, the theory and methodology of the two disciplines have evolved in remarkably similar ways. In addition to Darwin's curious parallels of process, there are a number of equally curious parallels and connections between the development of methods in biology and historical linguistics. Here we briefly review the parallels between biological and linguistic evolution and contrast the historical development of phylogenetic methods in the two disciplines. We then look at a number of recent studies that have applied phylogenetic methods to language data and outline some current problems shared by the two fields.
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Affiliation(s)
- Quentin D Atkinson
- Department of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1020, New Zealand
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Gray RD, Atkinson QD. Language-tree divergence times support the Anatolian theory of Indo-European origin. Nature 2003; 426:435-9. [PMID: 14647380 DOI: 10.1038/nature02029] [Citation(s) in RCA: 221] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/18/2003] [Accepted: 08/22/2003] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Abstract
Languages, like genes, provide vital clues about human history. The origin of the Indo-European language family is "the most intensively studied, yet still most recalcitrant, problem of historical linguistics". Numerous genetic studies of Indo-European origins have also produced inconclusive results. Here we analyse linguistic data using computational methods derived from evolutionary biology. We test two theories of Indo-European origin: the 'Kurgan expansion' and the 'Anatolian farming' hypotheses. The Kurgan theory centres on possible archaeological evidence for an expansion into Europe and the Near East by Kurgan horsemen beginning in the sixth millennium BP. In contrast, the Anatolian theory claims that Indo-European languages expanded with the spread of agriculture from Anatolia around 8,000-9,500 years bp. In striking agreement with the Anatolian hypothesis, our analysis of a matrix of 87 languages with 2,449 lexical items produced an estimated age range for the initial Indo-European divergence of between 7,800 and 9,800 years bp. These results were robust to changes in coding procedures, calibration points, rooting of the trees and priors in the bayesian analysis.
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Affiliation(s)
- Russell D Gray
- Department of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1020, New Zealand.
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