Tanaka Mark M, Kendal Jeremy R, Laland Kevin N
Evolution & Ecology Research Centre, School of Biotechnology & Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
PLoS One. 2009;4(4):e5192. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0005192. Epub 2009 Apr 15.
Complementary medicines, traditional remedies and home cures for medical ailments are used extensively world-wide, representing more than US$60 billion sales in the global market. With serious doubts about the efficacy and safety of many treatments, the industry remains steeped in controversy. Little is known about factors affecting the prevalence of efficacious and non-efficacious self-medicative treatments. Here we develop mathematical models which reveal that the most efficacious treatments are not necessarily those most likely to spread. Indeed, purely superstitious remedies, or even maladaptive practices, spread more readily than efficacious treatments under specified circumstances. Low-efficacy practices sometimes spread because their very ineffectiveness results in longer, more salient demonstration and a larger number of converts, which more than compensates for greater rates of abandonment. These models also illuminate a broader range of phenomena, including the spread of innovations, medical treatment of animals, foraging behaviour, and self-medication in non-human primates.
补充药物、传统疗法和家庭医疗偏方在全球被广泛使用，全球市场销售额超过600亿美元。由于对许多疗法的有效性和安全性存在严重质疑，该行业仍深陷争议之中。关于影响有效和无效自我药疗疗法普及程度的因素，人们知之甚少。在此，我们开发了数学模型，这些模型表明，最有效的疗法不一定是那些最有可能传播的疗法。事实上，在特定情况下，纯粹迷信的疗法，甚至是适应不良的做法，比有效疗法传播得更容易。低效做法有时会传播，因为它们的无效性导致展示时间更长、更显著，且有更多的转变者，这足以弥补更高的放弃率。这些模型还阐明了更广泛的现象，包括创新的传播、动物的医疗治疗、觅食行为以及非人类灵长类动物的自我药疗。
