Cumulative cultural evolution: the role of teaching

In humans, cultural transmission occurs usually by cumulative inheritance, generating complex adaptive behavioral features. Cumulative culture requires key psychological processes (fundamentally imitation and teaching) that are absent or impoverished in non-human primates. In this paper we analyze the role that teaching has played in human cumulative cultural evolution. We assume that a system of cumulative culture generates increasingly adaptive behaviors, that are also more complex and difficult to imitate. Our thesis is that, as cultural traits become more complex, cumulative cultural transmission requires teaching to ensure accurate transmission from one generation to the next. In an increasingly complex cultural environment, we consider that individuals commit errors in imitation. We develop a model of cumulative cultural evolution in a changing environment and show that these errors hamper the process of cultural accumulation. We also show that a system of teaching between parents and offspring that increases the fidelity of imitation unblocks the accumulation and becomes adaptive whenever the gain in fitness compensates the cost of teaching.