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Very interesting, but one should certainly be VERY cautious about implying
that results from current h&g groups can be easily generalized to those in
our prehistory....very different situations, in terms of ecology (both
social and natural).
On Wed, 30 Mar 2011, Stanley Wasserman wrote:
> ***** To join INSNA, visit http://www.insna.org *****
>
> What do you all think?
>
>
> SW
>
>
> *****************
> From SCIENCE:
>
>
> Prehistoric Social Networks
>
> A hunter-gatherer life-style is thought to have been the predominant social structure for most of human history. The common assumption is that hunter-gatherer groups consisted largely of related individuals: parents, siblings, and offspring, possibly extending to include spousal relations. In a Research Article in the 11 Mar 2011 Science, Hill et al. analyzed the kin relationships of groups in 32 contemporary hunter-gatherer societies and found that these societies display a social structure different from any other primate or vertebrate (listen to the related podcast interview with lead author Kim Hill). Although adult brothers and sisters often co-reside, most individuals in residential groups are genetically unrelated. In addition, both sexes alike can choose to leave their group or to stay, and neither the maternal lineage nor the paternal lineage is dominant within a group. These patterns produce large interaction networks of unrelated adults and suggest that inclusive fitness cannot explain extensive cooperation in hunter-gatherer bands. However, large social networks may help to explain why humans evolved capacities for social learning that resulted in cumulative culture. An accompanying Perspective by B. Chapais considered how the unique multigroup structure of human societies may have originated.
>
>
> Here's the abstract:
>
> Science 11 March 2011:
> Vol. 331 no. 6022 pp. 1286-1289
>
> Co-Residence Patterns in Hunter-Gatherer Societies Show Unique Human Social Structure
>
> Kim R. Hill1,*,
> Robert S. Walker2,*,
> Miran Božičević1,
> James Eder1,
> Thomas Headland3,4,
> Barry Hewlett5,6,
> A. Magdalena Hurtado1,
> Frank Marlowe7,
> Polly Wiessner8, and
> Brian Wood9
> *To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: [log in to unmask] (K.R.H.); [log in to unmask] (R.W.)
>
> Abstract
>
> Contemporary humans exhibit spectacular biological success derived from cumulative culture and cooperation. The origins of these traits may be related to our ancestral group structure. Because humans lived as foragers for 95% of our species’ history, we analyzed co-residence patterns among 32 present-day foraging societies (total n = 5067 individuals, mean experienced band size = 28.2 adults). We found that hunter-gatherers display a unique social structure where (i) either sex may disperse or remain in their natal group, (ii) adult brothers and sisters often co-reside, and (iii) most individuals in residential groups are genetically unrelated. These patterns produce large interaction networks of unrelated adults and suggest that inclusive fitness cannot explain extensive cooperation in hunter-gatherer bands. However, large social networks may help to explain why humans evolved capacities for social learning that resulted in cumulative culture.
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Lynn Smith-Lovin
Robert L. Wilson Professor of Arts and Sciences
Department of Sociology
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