PSY 3126 Lecture 2: Culture and Human Nature Lecture + Textbook Notes
28 Apr 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
September 13, 2017
Culture and Human Nature
Is culture unique to humans?
Depends on your definition of culture
Specific/concrete definition: culture = having symbolic meaning that other members of that culture recognize
-Then yes, only humans have this
-But this is circular - defines culture based on characteristics that are unique to humans
-Ex. Certain meanings for certain words, certain meanings for specific emojis
More abstract definition: culture = learning through social transmission
-Then no, culture isn’t unique to humans
Ex. Cultural learning in other species
-Imo, the potato-washing Japanese macaque: started washing potatoes in the stream and then other macaques
were seen doing this activity
-Chimpanzee “cultures”: 39 behaviours that vary across chimp troupes (tool usage, grooming habits, courtship
rituals)
•Ex. Different uses of tools: “twig-fishers” (use twigs to dig out bugs) vs. “bark-fishers” (use bark to dig out bugs)
-Bottlenose dolphins: use of sea sponges to protect beak from scratches while foraging is a practice specific to
dolphins in a particular region
-Orcas: whale pods can be distinguished from one another by the different types of sounds that they make (“whale
dialect”)
Cultural Learning in Humans
Humans aren’t unique in the use of cultural learning, but the differ from other species based on:
-Speed/efficiency of cultural learning: can occur after a single exposure
-Prestige bias: use of “prestige” cues to be able to detect and copy prestigious individuals indiscriminately and
faithfully
•Ability to attend to markers of prestige has been selected for in humans
•Maximizes success by copying successful individuals, but also results in transmission of irrelevant/inefficient
behaviours
-Our general imitating mechanism leads us to want to do everything that prestigious people do, even if we
often end up copying the wrong behaviours - maximizes the odds that we learn the skills that lead to success
-Ex. Using celebrities to promote products that have nothing to do with what made them successful
1
September 13, 2017
Unique Human Cognitive Abilities
Two key cognitive abilities facilitate the unique quality of cultural learning in humans
1. Theory of Mind (ToM): ability to understand that others have minds, intentions, and perspectives different from
one’s own
-Ex. Sally-Anne task used to test this in children: Sally places marble in basket and then leaves the room, Anne
moves marble into a box, Sally comes back - where will Sally look for the marble?
•ToM: in the basket
•No ToM: in the box
-Develops at a fairly similar rate across culture
-Mostly unique to humans - mixed results with chimpanzees
-NB: don’t necessarily need to understand the other person’s point of view, just need to be aware that they have
their own that might be different than yours
-Advantages: imitation vs. emulation
•Imitative learning (humans): internalization of model’s goals and behavioural strategies
-Learners over-imitate model
-Focus on achieving goal of the model
-Requires ToM
-Requires a model
-Less efficient (leads to the copying of irrelevant behaviours), but enables high-fidelity reproduction of target
behaviour
-Allows for cumulative cultural learning (see below) - what makes humans unique
•Emulative learning (other primates): learning focuses on how an object affects environment
-Focus on how to manipulate an object to change the environment
•Ex. Chimp sees other chimp getting bananas with a stick and focuses on how to use the stick, not
necessarily why you would use the stick
-Focuses on the events that happen around the model, rather than what the model intends to accomplish
-Doesn’t require ToM
-Doesn’t require imitating a model’s behavioural strategies
-More efficient: learner can directly figure out effective ways of using a tool, learner doesn’t copy irrelevant
actions (only copies the useful actions)
-Doesn’t allow for cumulative cultural learning
2
