Beyond the here and now: hunter-gatherer socio-spatial complexity and the evolution of language

Human evolutionary ecology stands to benefit by integrating theory and methods developed in movement ecology, and in turn, to make contributions to the broader field of movement ecology by leveraging our species' distinct attributes. In this paper, we review data and evolutionary models suggest...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B. Biological sciences 2024-10, Vol.379 (1912), p.20220521
Main Authors: Wood, Brian M, Raichlen, David A, Pontzer, Herman, Harris, Jacob A, Sayre, M Katherine, Paolo, Bunga, Anyawire, Mariamu, Mabulla, Audax Z P
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animals
Biological Evolution
Humans
Language
Papio anubis - physiology
Papio anubis - psychology
Social Behavior
Spatial Behavior
Tanzania
Citations: Items that this one cites
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Human evolutionary ecology stands to benefit by integrating theory and methods developed in movement ecology, and in turn, to make contributions to the broader field of movement ecology by leveraging our species' distinct attributes. In this paper, we review data and evolutionary models suggesting that major changes in socio-spatial behaviour accompanied the evolution of language. To illustrate and explore these issues, we present a comparison of GPS measures of the socio-spatial behaviour of Hadza hunter-gatherers of northern Tanzania to those of olive baboons ( ), a comparatively small-brained primate that is also savanna-adapted. While standard spatial metrics show modest differences, measures of spatial diversity, landscape exploration and spatiotemporal displacement between individuals differ markedly. Groups of Hadza foragers rapidly accumulate a vast, diverse knowledge pool about places and things over the horizon, contrasting with the baboon's narrower and more homogeneous pool of ecological information. The larger and more complex socio-spatial world illustrated by the Hadza is one where heightened cognitive abilities for spatial and episodic memory, navigation, perspective taking and communication about things beyond the here and now all have clear value.This article is part of the theme issue 'The spatial-social interface: a theoretical and empirical integration'.
ISSN:0962-8436
1471-2970
1471-2970
DOI:10.1098/rstb.2022.0521