Joint attention skills in wild arabian babblers turdoides squamiceps. The cooperative breeding hypothesis can plug this gap and thus complement cgs, because recent comparative. This behaviour is particularly well studied in birds, using both longterm and comparative studies that have provided insights into the evolution of reproductive altruism. The evolution and development of human cooperation federica amici. The cultural group selection cgs approach provides a compelling explanation for recent changes in human societies, but has trouble explaining why our ancestors, rather than any other great ape, evolved into a hyper cooperative niche. Human cooperation strongly relies on the ability of interlocutors to coordinate each others attentional state. Humans are not cooperative breeders but practice biocultural. E book or pdf edited book email encyclopedia article govt. Cooperative breeding and monogamy in mammalian societies. Hrdy university of california, department of anthropology, davis, ca 956168522, u. I argue that a cooperative breeding model provides a more compelling explanation for distinctive human emotional and mental aptitudes than do competing hypotheses. Here we propose that these cognitive consequences of cooperative breeding could have become more pervasive in the human lineage because the psychological changes were added to an apelevel cognitive system capable of understanding simple mental states, albeit mainly in. The expensivetissue hypothesis1 explains its evolution by proposing a tradeoff between the size of the brain and that of the digestive tract, which is smaller than expected for.
Evolution of human cooperation anthropology bibliographies. Big brains consume a large proportion of the energy available to an organism, in particular in immatures. It may also correlate with a social system in which each person is identified with their matriline their mothers lineage and which can involve the inheritance of property andor titles. The origins of cooperative breeding are traced to misdirected parental care in species with intense parenting of altricial young. Fundamental problems with the cooperative breeding. Humans take more or less twenty years to reach reproductive ma. Reliance on allomaternal assistance would make maternal commitment more dependent on the mothers. Second, pressure to recruit adult cooperation is most pronounced under more derived conditions of late dispersal and later ages of juvenile dependence, with a strong interaction at short birth intervals. When reproduction is monopolized by one or few of the adult group members and most adults do not reproduce, but help rear the breeders offspring, the majority of these cooperative breeding species exhibit high reproductive skew. Jul 18, 2012 cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution, evolutionary anthropology 18 2009. Callitrichids including marmosets and tamarins are highly vocal monkeys that are more distantly related to humans. Abstract despite sharing a recent common ancestor, humans are surprisingly different from other great apes. A causal link might exist because motivational and cognitive processes necessary for the execution and coordination of helping behaviors could also favor cognitive performance in contexts not directly.
The timeline of human evolution spans approximately 7 million years, from the separation of the genus pan until the emergence of behavioral modernity by 50,000 years ago. The evolution of cooperative breeding in early homo species also promoted other prosocial behaviors such as social learning, increased social. In cooperative games it is possible to make a binding agreement. Two key steps in the evolution of human cooperation. Among the species that adopted it, cooperative breeding generally produced changes in psychology toward greater prosociality and greater cognitive abilities. Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution core. Implications of this evolutionary context for the sociocognitive and emotional. Suzuki2 abstract cooperative breeding is a widespread and intense form of coop eration, in which individuals help raise offspring that are not their own. Cognitive evolution download ebook pdf, epub, tuebl, mobi.
Sep 27, 2011 1 a similar argument is found in dubreuils book human evolution and the origins of hierarchies. Most scholars of language evolution recognize that the first use of language, in particular words, presupposed an unusual ability to cooperate. Review the evolution of cooperative breeding in birds. Group territorial behavior and cooperative breeding are now recognized as widespread phenomena among birds of warmtemperate, subtropical, and tropical climates. If cooperative breeding does not generate novel selection pressures on. Kramer one conspicuous lifehistory feature of primates generally and humans speci. Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution faculty. Among many nonhuman primates and mammals in general, cooperative breeding is accompanied by psychological changes leading to greater prosociality, which directly enhances performance in social cognition. Language is a cognitively demanding human trait, but it is also a fundamentally cooperative enterprise that rests on the motivation to share information. Cooperative breeding is a social system in which individuals contribute care to offspring that are not their own at the expense of their own reproduction. Proponents of the cbh argue that cooperative breeding leads to increased cognitive performance, calling upon cognitive and motivational processes including spontaneous prosocial tendencies, attending to and learning from.
Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution. The most obvious discontinuities are related to our cognitive abilities, including language, but we also have a markedly different, coopera. Here i focus on the implications for the emotional and cognitive. Cooperative breeding and the evolution of vocal flexibility. Particularly vexing has been identifying the ecological correlates of this phenomenon, which has been suggested to be favored in populations inhabiting both relatively stable, productive. Primates communicate not only because they are biologically hardwired to do so, but also because they pursue specific goals during social interactions. Cooperative breeding, in which more than a pair of conspecifics cooperate to raise young at a single nest or brood, is widespread among vertebrates but highly variable in its geographic distribution.
Cooperative breeders are species in which individuals beyond a pair assist in the production of young in a single brood or litter. Unraveling the evolution of uniquely human cognition pnas. The most obvious discontinuities are related to our cognitive abilities, including language, but we also have a markedly different, cooperative breeding system. Sep 24, 2009 we propose that the evolution of these derived features was a consequence of the adoption of cooperative breeding by early homo. The acceptance of novel foods by infants is socially. Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution, evolutionary anthropology 18 2009. The most obvious discontinuities are related to our cognitive. Michael tomasello has greatly expanded our knowledge of human cognition and how it differs from that of other animals. Ecological factors which cause selection for group territorial behavior are considered to be high adult survival and saturation of suitable habitat, modified by the demands of. Wilson updates his earlier groundbreaking treatment of homo sapiens.
Humans have a number of adaptations that facilitate the creation and. Therefore, human offspring are highly dependent on caregiver investment, a necessity that serves as the precursor for theories on the development of pairbonding, alloparenting, and cooperative breeding. Although relatively rare, this behaviour entails dramatic forms of both cooperation and competition, and gives important insights into many areas including sexual selection and incest avoidance. Cooperative breeding encompasses a wide variety of group structures, from a breeding pair with helpers that are offspring from a previous season, to groups with multiple breeding males and females polygynandry and helpers that are the adult offspring of some but not all of the breeders in the group, to groups in which helpers sometimes achieve cobreeding status by producing their own offspring as. Pdf despite sharing a recent common ancestor, humans are surprisingly different from other great apes. Cooperative breeding in vertebrates edited by walter d. Although relatively rare, cooperative breeding is widespread taxonomically and continues to pose challenges to our understanding of the evolution of cooperation and altruistic behavior. His book sociobiology 1975 initiated a field that has become a major research area in the behavioral sciences and included a controversial chapter on human social evolution. Energetics and the evolution of human brain size ana navarrete 1, carel p. According to the cooperative breeding hypothesis, allomaternal assistance was essential for child survival during the pleistocene. Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution j. Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution 2009 evolutionary anthropology. Comparative analyses suggest that cooperative breeding and allomaternal care in plural and communal breeders have distinct evolutionary. Unraveling the evolution of uniquely human cognition.
No evidence for larger brains in cooperatively breeding. Ultimately, the absence of any compelling evidence that cooperative breeding is associated with elevated cognitive ability or large brains indeed data suggest the opposite is true in non. The human brain stands out among mammals by being unusually large. Among many nonhuman primates and mammals in general, cooperative breeding is accompanied by psychological changes leading to greater. Longterm studies of behavior and ecology 1990, hb isbn 0521 372984, pb isbn 0521 378907.
Joint attention skills in wild arabian babblers turdoides. Cognitive evolution provides an indepth exploration of the history and development of cognition, from the beginning of life on earth to presentday humans. In eusocial insects, kin selection provides the only viable explanation for the evolution and maintenance of worker sterility 68, while in many obligately. Cooperative breeding is relevant to debates in anthropology concerning the evolution of human life history, sociality, and psychology and has implications for demographic patterns in todays world. Cooperative breeders are species in which more than two individuals participate in raising young at a single nest. This is well documented in the context of ape gestural signals, which have revealed a considerable degree of flexibility in interesting ways. Cooperative breeding center for academic research and.
Nov 20, 20 increasingly, human parenting behavior, which has been described as cooperative breeding because allomaternal parental care is essential for the raising of human young, is recognized as having played an important role in the evolution of these characteristics. Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution burkart. This breeding system permitted hominid females to produce offspring without increasing interbirth intervals, and allowed for movement into new habitats. In terms of vocal behavior, however, both monkeys and apes appear to be much less flexible, which. Cambridge core animal behaviour cooperative breeding in vertebrates edited by walter d. Drawing together evolutionary and comparative research, this book. Studies of ecology, evolution, and behavior kindle edition by koenig, walter d. In other cooperative breeding species, pressuresthat lead to cooperativebreedinginclude predation risk, environmental unpredictability, and. There, however, the focus is more on joint attention and norm following than on executive control. I strongly recommend this book to any biologist interested in behavioral ecology, sociality, or ornithology. Book symposium open access henrike moll tension in the natural history of human thinking doi 10.
Matrilineality is the tracing of kinship through the female line. The evolution of group territorial behavior and cooperative. The questions above address different levels of explanation 1, 2 for human cognitive uniqueness, but ultimately a satisfactory account of human cognitive evolution will explain not only the mechanisms that make our species unique, but also how, when, and why these traits evolved. One predominant hypothesis postulates that this hallmark of the unique cognitive system of humans evolved due to the combination of an apelike cognitive system and the prosocial motives that facilitate cooperative breeding. Cooperative breeding encompasses a range of unusually flexible monogamous, polygynous and polyandrous mating systems in which individuals of either sex may mate sequentially or at the same time with one more partners, with one common feature. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading cooperative breeding in vertebra tes. Pdf cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution. The role of ontogeny in the evolution of human cooperation.
Energetics and the evolution of human brain size nature. Among many nonhuman primates and mammals in general, cooperative breeding is accompanied by psychological changes leading to greater prosociality, which directly enhances performance in. Revisiting the consequences of cooperative breeding. May 01, 2011 this ambitious book covers many areas including policy, society, economics, game theory, sociology, neurobiology, evolution, and group dynamics, just to name a few. Great apes possess many of the cognitive prerequisites for language, but largely lack the motivation to share information. Yitzchak ben mocha1,2,3, roger mundry2 and simone pika4,5 1research group evolution of communication, max planck institute for ornithology, seewiesen, germany. Revisiting the consequences of cooperative breeding uzh. Here we propose that these cognitive consequences of cooperative breeding. Occasional cooperative breeding in birds and the robustness. Cooperative behaviour has been shown to provide individuals with either direct fitness benefits e. Oct 26, 2009 the most obvious discontinuities are related to our cognitive abilities, including language, but we also have a markedly different, cooperative breeding system. The lack of any evidence linking cooperative breeding with brain size evolution in non. According to this viewpoint, human intelligence rests on a. Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution citeseerx.
Evolution of human cooperation anthropology bibliographies in harvard style. Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution semantic. Recent years have seen the emergence of a novel variant of this hypothesis, suggesting that cooperative breeding is associated with the elaboration of socio cognitive abilities. Several hypotheses propose that cooperative breeding leads to increased cognitive performance, in both nonhuman and human primates, but systematic evidence for such a relationship is missing. This book highlights the theoretical, empirical and technical advances that have taken place in the field of cooperative breeding research since the publication of the seminal work cooperative breeding in birds. To date, scientists have made substantial progress toward defining uniquely human aspects of cognition, but considerably less effort has been devoted to questions about the evolutionary processes through which. Cooperation and helping behavior download ebook pdf. Cognitive consequences of cooperative breeding in primates.
Cooperative feeding and breeding, and the evolution of. Humans and chimps are the most unlike in on these measures, with humans showing a very similar profile to callitrichids. Chapter 6, meet the alloparents, focuses instead on the development of cooperative breeding in the human lineage. A causal link might exist because motivational and cognitive processes necessary for the execution and coordination of helping behaviors could also favor cognitive performance in contexts not directly related to caregiving. Building on decades of research, hrdy 2009 and others e. Cooperative breeding and human evolution request pdf. Van schaik despite sharing a recent common ancestor, humans are surprisingly different from other great apes. If so, maternaljuvenile cooperation may be an important but understudied step in the evolution of human cooperative breeding.
In most cooperatively breeding species, helpers are offspring that remain with their. Jul 24, 2009 several hypotheses propose that cooperative breeding leads to increased cognitive performance, in both nonhuman and human primates, but systematic evidence for such a relationship is missing. In this commentary to his recent book a natural history of human thinking, i first critique some of. Here we propose that these cognitive consequences of cooperative breeding could have become more pervasive in the human lineage because the psycho. Ecology and evolution of cooperative breeding in birds. Cooperative breeding is a widespread and intense form of cooperation, in which individuals help raise offspring that are not their own. Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution jm burkart, sb hrdy, cp van schaik evolutionary anthropology. The evolution of human intelligence is closely tied to the evolution of the human brain and to the origin of language. Hatchwell department of animal and plant sciences, university of shef. Among many nonhuman primates and mammals in general, cooperative breeding is accompanied by psychological changes leading to greater prosociality, which directly enhances performance in social. She is considered a highly recognized pioneer in modernizing our understanding of the evolutionary basis of female behavior in both nonhuman and human primates. Despite sharing a recent common ancestor, humans are surprisingly different from other great apes. Fundamental problems with the cooperative breeding hypothesis.