ReviewPhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences2018
Cultural transmission in an ever-changing world: trial-and-error copying may be more robust than precise imitation.
Review in Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed.
- Mechanisms of Altered Imitation in Autism Spectrum Disorders.Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research · 2025Article
- Complex foraging behaviours in wild birds emerge from social learning and recombination of components.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2022Article
- A Theoretical Model of Transition to Practice for Athletic Trainers.Journal of athletic training · 2021Article
- Prestige and content biases together shape the cultural transmission of narratives.Evolutionary human sciences · 2021Article
- The value of teaching increases with tool complexity in cumulative cultural evolution.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2020Article
- High-fidelity copying is not necessarily the key to cumulative cultural evolution: a study in monkeys and children.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2019Article
- Song variation of the South Eastern Indian Ocean pygmy blue whale population in the Perth Canyon, Western Australia.PloS one · 2019Article
- Cultural transmission in an ever-changing world: trial-and-error copying may be more robust than precise imitation.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2018Review
- Bridging cultural gaps: interdisciplinary studies in human cultural evolution.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
2 authors.
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No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Cultural transmission facilitates the spread of behaviours within social groups and may lead to the establishment of stable traditions in both human and non-human animals. The fidelity of transmission is frequently emphasized as a core component of cultural evolution and as a prerequisite for cumulative culture. Fidelity is often considered a synonym of precise copying of observed behaviours. However, while precise copying guarantees reliable transmission in an ideal static world, it may be vulnerable to realistic variability in the actual environment. Here, we argue that fidelity may be more naturally achieved when the social learning mechanisms incorporate trial-and-error; and that the robustness of social transmission is thereby increased. We employed a simple model to demonstrate how culture that is produced through exact copying is fragile in an (even slightly) noisy world. When incorporating a certain degree of trial-and-error, however, cultures are more readily formed in a stochastic environment and are less vulnerable to rare ecological changes. We suggest that considering trial-and-error learning as a stabilizing component of social transmission may provide insights into cultural evolution in a realistic, variable, world.This article is part of the theme issue 'Bridging cultural gaps: interdisciplinary studies in human cultural evolution'.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.