Abstract
High-fidelity transmission of information through imitation and teaching has been proposed as necessary for cumulative cultural evolution. Yet, it is unclear when and for which knowledge domains children employ different social learning processes. This paper explores the development of social learning processes and play in BaYaka hunter-gatherer children by analysing video recordings and time budgets of children from early infancy to adolescence. From infancy to early childhood, hunter-gatherer children learn mainly by imitating and observing others’ activities. From early childhood, learning occurs mainly in playgroups and through practice. Throughout childhood boys engage in play more often than girls whereas girls start foraging wild plants from early childhood and spend more time in domestic activities and childcare. Sex differences in play reflect the emergence of sexual division of labour and the play-work transition occurring earlier for girls. Consistent with theoretical models, teaching occurs for skills/knowledge that cannot be transmitted with high fidelity through other social learning processes such as the acquisition of abstract information e.g. social norms. Whereas, observational and imitative learning occur for the transmission of visually transparent skills such as tool use, foraging, and cooking. These results suggest that coevolutionary relationships between human sociality, language and teaching have likely been fundamental in the emergence of human cumulative culture.
Highlights
The length of human childhood is an evolutionary puzzle
If teaching co-evolved with cumulative culture to facilitate the transmission of complex information, teaching should occur only for those activities that would be difficult to learn without direct guidance and instruction, which we aim to test here
Understanding for which activity domains specific social learning processes are employed may have added implications for our understanding of cultural transmission dynamics, and inform us regarding the evolutionary relationship between cumulative culture, teaching and language
Summary
The length of human childhood is an evolutionary puzzle. An average hunter-gatherer male spends the first 18 years of his life being dependent on others for food[1]. In evolutionary biology teaching refers to instances when a knowledgeable individual modifies their own behaviour in the presence of a naïve individual, either at a cost to itself or with no immediate benefit, and as a result the naïve individual acquires new knowledge or skill earlier or quicker than s/he would have done otherwise[23] Following this definition, scholars have documented cases of teaching in extant hunter-gatherers[20,24,25], as well as reliance on active teaching for the acquisition of social norms[5]. Extant hunter-gatherers are good models to test these predictions and untangle the evolutionary relationships between teaching, culture and language because their way of life, characterized by small nomadic groups, lack of political hierarchies and food storage, mimic the environment in which human culture and cooperation have evolved. The skills and knowledge that are transmitted in extant hunter-gatherers are likely to resemble those learned in ancestral societies
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