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Updated: Jun 7, 2025
04:56
Assessment of Social Transmission of Food Preferences Behaviors
Published on: January 25, 2018
7.9K
Cultural transmission among hunter-gatherers.
Barry S Hewlett1, Adam H Boyette2, Sheina Lew-Levy3
1Department of Anthropology, Washington State University, Vancouver, WA 98686.
Summary
Children in mobile hunter-gatherer societies learn through diverse social transmission modes, including vertical, horizontal, oblique, and group learning. These mechanisms are crucial for cultural conservation and the development of cumulative culture.
Area of Science:
- Anthropology
- Evolutionary Biology
- Cultural Evolution
Background:
- Mobile hunter-gatherer societies represent a significant portion of human history.
- Previous research has not fully explored all social learning transmission modes in these groups.
- Understanding learning mechanisms is key to understanding cultural transmission.
Purpose of the Study:
- To examine the diverse ways children learn in mobile hunter-gatherer societies.
- To analyze previously unevaluated transmission modes (Cavalli-Sforza & Feldman, 1981) in hunter-gatherer research.
- To introduce and explore novel group transmission modes: conformist, concerted, and cumulative transmission.
Main Methods:
- Review of recent studies on transmission modes in hunter-gatherers.
- Analysis of five transmission modes from Cavalli-Sforza and Feldman (1981).
- Examination of ethnographic data to identify group transmission types.
Main Results:
- Vertical transmission's role in cultural trait conservation may be underestimated due to overlooking remote generations and distinguishing transmission types.
- Hunter-gatherer children learn significantly from non-genetically related individuals (approx. 50% of horizontal/oblique learning).
- Intimate living conditions facilitate group transmission, with at least three types identified, contributing to cultural conservation and diversity.
Conclusions:
- Hunter-gatherer children learn through a complex interplay of vertical, horizontal, oblique, and group transmission.
- Group transmission modes (conformist, concerted, cumulative) are vital for cultural conservation, homogeneity, and diversity.
- The study highlights various mechanisms of learning and cultural transmission in hunter-gatherer societies, contributing to cumulative culture.
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