Observational studyProceedings. Biological sciences2022
Costly teaching contributes to the acquisition of spear hunting skill among BaYaka forager adolescents.
Observational study in Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers.
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Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed.
- The social learning and development of intra- and inter-ethnic sharing norms in the Congo Basin.PloS one · 2026Article
- Teaching is associated with the transmission of opaque culture and leadership across 23 egalitarian hunter-gatherer societies.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Cultural transmission among hunter-gatherers.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024Article
- First direct evidence of lion hunting and the early use of a lion pelt by Neanderthals.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Atlatl use equalizes female and male projectile weapon velocity.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Intergroup Cooperation in Shotgun Hunting Among BaYaka Foragers and Yambe Farmers from the Republic of the Congo.Human nature (Hawthorne, N.Y.) · 2023Article
- The cultural evolution of teaching.Evolutionary human sciences · 2023Review
- A double-pointed wooden throwing stick from Schöningen, Germany: Results and new insights from a multianalytical study.PloS one · 2023Article
- Despite COVID: showcasing new research in evolutionary biology from academic care-givers in the middle of a pandemic.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2022Article
- Costly teaching contributes to the acquisition of spear hunting skill among BaYaka forager adolescents.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2022Observational
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
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Abstract
Teaching likely evolved in humans to facilitate the faithful transmission of complex tasks. As the oldest evidenced hunting technology, spear hunting requires acquiring several complex physical and cognitive competencies. In this study, we used observational and interview data collected among BaYaka foragers (Republic of the Congo) to test the predictions that costlier teaching types would be observed at a greater frequency than less costly teaching in the domain of spear hunting and that teachers would calibrate their teaching to pupil skill level. To observe naturalistic teaching during spear hunting, we invited teacher-pupil groupings to spear hunt while wearing GoPro cameras. We analysed 68 h of footage totalling 519 teaching episodes. Most observed teaching events were costly. Direct instruction was the most frequently observed teaching type. Older pupils received less teaching and more opportunities to lead the spear hunt than their younger counterparts. Teachers did not appear to adjust their teaching to pupil experience, potentially because age was a more easily accessible heuristic for pupil skill than experience. Our study shows that costly teaching is frequently used to transmit complex tasks and that instruction may play a privileged role in the transmission of spear hunting knowledge.
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