Department of Anthropology, Environmental Studies Program, Harpur College of Arts and Sciences, Binghamton University, Binghamton, NY, United States of America.
Department of Anthropology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2021 May 12;16(5):e0250690. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0250690. eCollection 2021.
Understanding how and why cultural diversity changes in human populations remains a central topic of debate in cultural evolutionary studies. Due to the effects of drift, small and isolated populations face evolutionary challenges in the retention of richness and diversity of cultural information. Such variation, however, can have significant fitness consequences, particularly when environmental conditions change unpredictably, such that knowledge about past environments may be key to long-term persistence. Factors that can shape the outcomes of drift within a population include the semantics of the traits as well as spatially structured social networks. Here, we use cultural transmission simulations to explore how social network structure and interaction affect the rate of trait retention and extinction. Using Rapa Nui (Easter Island, Chile) as an example, we develop a model-based hypothesis for how the structural constraints of communities living in small, isolated populations had dramatic effects and likely led to preventing the loss of cultural information in both community patterning and technology.
理解人类群体中文化多样性是如何以及为何发生变化，仍然是文化进化研究中的一个核心议题。由于漂变的影响，小型和孤立的群体在保留文化信息的丰富性和多样性方面面临着进化挑战。然而，这种变异可能会产生重大的适应后果，尤其是当环境条件不可预测地变化时，因为有关过去环境的知识可能是长期生存的关键。能够影响群体内部漂变结果的因素包括特征的语义以及空间结构的社会网络。在这里，我们使用文化传播模拟来探讨社会网络结构和相互作用如何影响特征的保留和灭绝速度。我们以拉帕努伊岛（智利复活节岛）为例，提出了一个基于模型的假设，即生活在小型、孤立群体中的社区的结构限制如何产生巨大影响，并可能防止了社区模式和技术中文化信息的丢失。
