Tamariz, M., Ellison, T. M., Barr, D. J. and Fay, N. (2014) Cultural selection drives the evolution of human communication systems. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Series B: Biological Sciences, 281(1788), p. 20140488. (doi: 10.1098/rspb.2014.0488)
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Abstract
Human communication systems evolve culturally, but the evolutionary mechanisms that drive this evolution are not well understood. Against a baseline that communication variants spread in a population following neutral evolutionary dynamics (also known as drift models), we tested the role of two cultural selection models: coordination- and content-biased. We constructed a parametrized mixed probabilistic model of the spread of communicative variants in four 8-person laboratory micro-societies engaged in a simple communication game. We found that selectionist models, working in combination, explain the majority of the empirical data. The best-fitting parameter setting includes an egocentric bias and a content bias, suggesting that participants retained their own previously used communicative variants unless they encountered a superior (content-biased) variant, in which case it was adopted. This novel pattern of results suggests that (i) a theory of the cultural evolution of human communication systems must integrate selectionist models and (ii) human communication systems are functionally adaptive complex systems.
Item Type: | Articles |
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Status: | Published |
Refereed: | Yes |
Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: | Fay, Dr Nicolas and Barr, Dr Dale |
Authors: | Tamariz, M., Ellison, T. M., Barr, D. J., and Fay, N. |
Subjects: | H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General) P Language and Literature > P Philology. Linguistics Q Science > QH Natural history > QH301 Biology |
College/School: | College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Psychology & Neuroscience |
Journal Name: | Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Series B: Biological Sciences |
Publisher: | The Royal Society |
ISSN: | 0962-8452 |
ISSN (Online): | 1471-2954 |
Copyright Holders: | Copyright © 2014 The Royal Society |
First Published: | First published in Proceedings of the Royal Society Series B: Biological Sciences 281(1788):20140488 |
Publisher Policy: | Reproduced under a Creative Commons License |
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