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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jun 7, 2026

Genetic Mapping of Thermotolerance Differences Between Species of Saccharomyces Yeast via Genome-Wide Reciprocal Hemizygosity Analysis

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Is horizontal transmission really a problem for phylogenetic comparative methods? A simulation study using continuous

Thomas E Currie¹, Simon J Greenhill, Ruth Mace

¹Human Evolutionary Ecology Group, Department of Anthropology, University College London, London WC1H 0BW, UK. tcurrie@darwin.c.u-tokyo.ac.jp

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological Sciences

|November 3, 2010

Summary

Phylogenetic comparative methods (PCMs) can accurately assess cultural trait evolution, even with horizontal transmission. These methods are robust, unlike some non-phylogenetic approaches, especially when traits spread independently.

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Area of Science:

Evolutionary biology
Cultural evolution
Comparative methods

Background:

Phylogenetic comparative methods (PCMs) are used to study trait evolution.
Horizontal transmission between cultures can complicate evolutionary analyses.
Previous simulation work has explored these effects, but further assessment is needed.

Purpose of the Study:

To evaluate the impact of horizontal transmission on phylogenetic and non-phylogenetic methods for inferring cultural trait evolution.
To determine the robustness of PCMs under different horizontal transmission scenarios.

Main Methods:

Simulated trait evolution data incorporating various modes of horizontal transmission.
Comparison of inference accuracy between PCMs and linear regression analyses.
Assessment of ancestral state reconstruction capabilities.

Main Results:

PCMs accurately identified uncorrelated traits even with high separate horizontal transmission.
Linear regression often incorrectly inferred correlations.
Both methods showed increased correlation inference with paired horizontal transmission when traits were uncorrelated.
PCMs demonstrated robustness to horizontal transmission and accurate ancestral state inference.

Conclusions:

PCMs can be robust to horizontal transmission in cultural evolution studies under specific conditions.
The mode of horizontal transmission significantly impacts the reliability of evolutionary inferences.
Future research should focus on the dynamics of horizontal cultural transmission.