Cultural evolution articles from across Nature Portfolio

How did human culture become ecologically dominant? Morgan and Feldman re-examine existing theoretical accounts and propose that, contrary to previous belief, cumulative change and high transmission fidelity are not unique to human culture.

Constructing and exploring a global database, the authors find that 10% of the world’s languages are endemic to islands (a disproportionately large amount) and island area predicts number of languages. However, languages appear not to conform to all predictions of island biogeography theory.

Central Africa is home to the greatest number of hunter-gatherers remaining in the world, but the origins of their culture remain unclear. We compiled a dataset of Central African hunter-gatherer musical instruments, subsistence tools, specialized vocabulary and genome-wide single-nucleotide polymorphism data, which revealed ancient networks of cultural and linguistic exchange that spanned thousands of kilometres.

Although we have been able to track how cultural innovations spread among farming populations in prehistoric Europe, we know relatively little about this among European hunter-gatherers. Dolbunova et al. use a range of techniques to shed light on how the making and use of pottery spread among early-to-mid-Holocene hunter-gatherers west of the Urals.

Undoubtedly our technology surpasses anything seen in nonhumans, but is this the result of individual genius or collective learning?

A study finds that social norms have become weaker in the United States over the past 200 years. The changing strength of norms is linked to fluctuations in societal levels of innovation and risky behaviour.