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2022

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cc by (c) Romano et al., 2022
Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/2445/183208

Reconstructing social networks of Late Glacial and Holocene hunter-gatherers to understand cultural evolution

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https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2020.0318

Abstract

Culture is increasingly being framed as a driver of human phenotypes and behaviour. Yet very little is known about variations in the patterns of past social interactions between humans in cultural evolution. The archaeological record, combined with modern evolutionary and analytical approaches, provides a unique opportunity to investigate broad-scale patterns of cultural change. Prompted by evidence that a population's social connectivity influences cultural variability, in this article, we revisit traditional approaches used to infer cultural evolutionary processes from the archaeological data. We then propose that frameworks considering multi-scalar interactions (from individuals to populations) over time and space have the potential to advance knowledge in cultural evolutionary theory. We describe how social network analysis can be applied to analyse diachronic structural changes and test cultural transmission hypotheses using the archaeological record (here specifically from the Marine Isotope Stage 3 ca 57-29 ka onwards). We argue that the reconstruction of prehistoric networks offers a timely opportunity to test the interplay between social connectivity and culture and ultimately helps to disentangle evolutionary mechanisms in the archaeological record. This article is part of a discussion meeting issue 'The emergence of collective knowledge and cumulative culture in animals, humans and machines'.

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Comportament col·lectiu, Evolució cultural, Arqueologia

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Collective behavior, Social evolution, Archaeology

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Articles publicats en revistes (Història Econòmica, Institucions, Política i Economia Mundial)
Articles publicats en revistes (Institut de Recerca en Sistemes Complexos (UBICS))
Publicacions de projectes de recerca finançats per la UE

Citation

ROMANO, Valéria, LOZANO, Sergi and FERNÁNDEZ LÓPEZ DE PABLO, Javier. Reconstructing social networks of Late Glacial and Holocene hunter-gatherers to understand cultural evolution. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 2022. Vol. 377, num. 20200318. ISSN 0962-8436. [consulted: 18 of August of 2026]. Available at: https://hdl.handle.net/2445/183208

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