High selection pressure promotes increase in cumulative adaptive culture

Area of Science:

• Evolutionary anthropology
• Cultural evolution
• Computational social science

Background:

• Cumulative adaptive culture is key to human evolution.
• Existing models link cultural complexity to population size, transmission rates, and innovation.
• The role of natural selection in cultural complexity remains under-explored.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the impact of natural selection, specifically resource pressure, on the evolution of cultural complexity.
• To model the interplay between demographic factors and selective pressures in cultural evolution.

Main Methods:

• Agent-based simulation modeling was employed.
• The model simulated cultural transmission, innovation, and selection under varying population sizes and resource pressures.

Main Results:

• High selection pressure (resource pressure) promotes adaptive culture accumulation, even with small populations and high innovation costs.
• The interaction between demography and selection is crucial for cultural complexity.
• Increased cultural complexity is predicted under conditions of high population pressure relative to resource availability.

Conclusions:

• Natural selection, particularly resource pressure, is a significant driver of cultural complexity.
• Demographic factors and selective pressures must be considered together to understand cultural evolution.
• This model explains culture change independent of major environmental shifts by highlighting shifting selective pressures.