Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

Evolution of New Traits in Microbes

Evolution of New Traits in Microbes

Microorganisms evolve rapidly due to their large population sizes and short generation times, often exhibiting measurable changes within days under laboratory conditions. Natural selection acts on standing genetic variation, enabling the retention and amplification of beneficial traits that confer fitness advantages in changing environments.Adaptive Pigment Regulation in RhodobacterIn Rhodobacter, a genus of purple non-sulfur bacteria, light-harvesting pigments such as bacteriochlorophyll and...

Evolutionary Psychology

Evolutionary Psychology

Evolutionary psychology explores the origins of human behavior and mental processes by framing them within the context of natural selection, a theory famously propounded by Charles Darwin. This field asserts that many behaviors common across human societies — ranging from instinctive fear reactions to complex social interactions — arose as evolutionary adaptations. These adaptations enhanced the survival and reproductive success of our ancestors, thereby becoming embedded in the human psyche...

The Nativist Approach

The Nativist Approach

The nativist approach to infant cognitive development proposes that infants are born with inherent knowledge structures that allow them to interpret the world almost immediately. This perspective contrasts with earlier developmental theories, such as those proposed by Jean Piaget, which emphasized a more gradual acquisition of cognitive abilities through interaction with the environment. One key concept in this approach is object permanence — the understanding that objects continue to exist...

Cognitive Learning

Cognitive Learning

Cognitive learning is based on purposive behavior, incidental learning, and insight learning.
E. C. Tolman's theory of purposive behavior emphasizes that much behavior is goal-directed. He argued that to understand behavior, we must look at the entire sequence of actions leading to a goal. For instance, high school students study hard, not just due to past reinforcement but also to achieve the goal of getting into a good college.
Tolman introduced the idea that behavior is influenced by...

Intelligence

Intelligence

The term "intelligence" is complex because it refers to both behavior and individuals, and its interpretation varies across cultures. European Americans tend to link intelligence with reasoning and cognitive skills, while in Kenya, it is tied to responsible participation in family and social life. In Uganda, intelligence is seen as the ability to know the right actions and carry them out effectively, while the Iatmul people of Papua New Guinea associate it with the capacity to remember detailed...

The Role of Culture

The Role of Culture

Culture plays a crucial role in shaping self-identity and influencing thought and behavior, a foundational interest within social psychology. The multicultural perspective recognizes that individuals do not exist in a vacuum; instead, their experiences, perceptions, and actions are deeply influenced by the intersecting dimensions of their cultural, ethnic, and social group affiliations.Cultural Influence on Self-Identity and Social PerceptionCultural frameworks inform how individuals define...

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

Feature-based reward learning shapes human social learning strategies.

Nature human behaviour·2025

Same author

Causal involvement of dorsomedial prefrontal cortex in learning the predictability of observable actions.

Nature communications·2024

Same author

The emergence of division of labour through decentralized social sanctioning.

Proceedings. Biological sciences·2023

Same author

Meta-control of social learning strategies.

PLoS computational biology·2022

Same author

Publisher Correction: A computational reward learning account of social media engagement.

Nature communications·2021

Same author

A computational reward learning account of social media engagement.

Nature communications·2021

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 28, 2026

The Innovation Arena: A Method for Comparing Innovative Problem-Solving Across Groups

The Innovation Arena: A Method for Comparing Innovative Problem-Solving Across Groups

Published on: May 13, 2022

Semantic knowledge guides innovation and drives cultural evolution.

Anil Yaman¹, Shen Tian², Björn Lindström²

¹Computer Science Department, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam 1081 HV, The Netherlands.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

|May 26, 2026

Summary

Semantic knowledge, the associations between concepts and their properties, drives human innovation and cumulative culture. This understanding guides exploration, enhances success, and accelerates cultural evolution, unlike random variation theories.

Keywords:

agent-based modeling cultural evolution semantic knowledge social learning

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: May 28, 2026

The Innovation Arena: A Method for Comparing Innovative Problem-Solving Across Groups

The Innovation Arena: A Method for Comparing Innovative Problem-Solving Across Groups

Published on: May 13, 2022

Area of Science:

Cognitive Science
Evolutionary Psychology
Cultural Evolution

Background:

Human cultural evolution relies on accumulating innovations across generations.
Social learning transmits innovations, but the cognitive generation of new ideas is poorly understood.
Classical theories inadequately explain complex cultural evolution, often simplifying innovation to random variation.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate the role of semantic knowledge in guiding human innovation.
To test if semantic knowledge drives cumulative culture.
To compare the effects of semantic knowledge versus random variation on innovation.

Main Methods:

An agent-based model simulating semantic knowledge's impact on cultural evolution.
A large-scale behavioral experiment (N=1,243) assessing semantic knowledge in human innovation.
Comparative analysis of innovation strategies with and without semantic knowledge access.

Main Results:

Semantic knowledge directed exploration towards meaningful solutions and enhanced innovation success.
Access to semantic knowledge enabled generalization from prior discoveries.
Semantic knowledge synergized with social learning, amplifying innovation and accelerating cultural change.
Participants without semantic knowledge showed chance-level performance and shallow exploration, even with social learning.

Conclusions:

Semantic knowledge is a critical cognitive process underpinning human cumulative culture.
It moves beyond random variation to provide a guided, efficient mechanism for innovation.
This finding highlights the interplay between cognition, learning, and cultural transmission.