Grist and mills: on the cultural origins of cultural learning.

Journal article

Cumulative cultural evolution is what 'makes us odd'; our capacity to learn facts and techniques from others, and to refine them over generations, plays a major role in making human minds and lives radically different from those of other animals. In this article, I discuss cognitive processes that are known collectively as 'cultural learning' because they enable cumulative cultural evolution. These cognitive processes include reading, social learning, imitation, teaching, social motivation an...

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Authors: Heyes, C

• Publication status: Published
• Journal: Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences
• Volume: 367
• Issue: 1599
• Pages: 2181-2191
• Publication date: 2012-08-01
• DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2012.0120
• EISSN: 1471-2970
• ISSN: 0962-8436
• Language: English
• Keywords: Humans; Motivation; Selection, Genetic; Reading; Cultural Evolution; Imitative Behavior; Theory of Mind; Learning; Animals; Interpersonal Relations; Social Adjustment; Mirror Neurons; Adaptation, Biological; Models, Biological