All Outputs (65)

Peer learning and cultural evolution (2023)
Journal Article
Lew-Levy, S., Bos, W. V. D., Corriveau, K. H., Dutra, N. B., Dutra, N., Flynn, E. G., O'Sullivan, E., Pope-Caldwell, S., Rawlings, B., Smolla, M., Xu, J., & Wood, L. (2023). Peer learning and cultural evolution. Child Development Perspectives, 17, 97-105. https://doi.org/10.1111/cdep.12482

In this article, we integrate cultural evolutionary theory with empirical research from developmental psychology, cultural anthropology, and primatology to explore the role of peer learning in the development of complex instrumental skills and behavi... Read More about Peer learning and cultural evolution.

Associations between men's reputations for fathering and their reproductive success among BaYaka foragers in the Congo Basin (2023)
Journal Article
Boyette, A. H., Lew-Levy, S., Valchy, M., & Gettler, L. T. (2023). Associations between men's reputations for fathering and their reproductive success among BaYaka foragers in the Congo Basin. Evolution and Human Behavior, 44(2), 110-119. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2023.02.005

It is generally recognized that paternal care is a facultative feature of human cooperative caregiving that helps underpin our evolved life history strategy. Yet, little direct evidence links variation in men's fathering to fitness outcomes. Research... Read More about Associations between men's reputations for fathering and their reproductive success among BaYaka foragers in the Congo Basin.

BaYaka forager food sharing networks in the Congo Basin: The roles of gender homophily and kin sharing (2023)
Journal Article
Gettler, L. T., Redhead, D., Dzabatou, A., & Lew-Levy, S. (2023). BaYaka forager food sharing networks in the Congo Basin: The roles of gender homophily and kin sharing. American Journal of Biological Anthropology, 181(1), 59-69. https://doi.org/10.1002/ajpa.24688

Objectives
Food sharing is a costly form of cooperation that was likely critical to human evolutionary success, including the emergence of human's life history strategy. Food sharing in human communities may be maintained through a number of pathway... Read More about BaYaka forager food sharing networks in the Congo Basin: The roles of gender homophily and kin sharing.

Toys as Teachers: A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Object Use and Enskillment in Hunter--Gatherer Societies (2022)
Journal Article
Riede, F., Lew-Levy, S., Johannsen, N. N., Johannsen, N. N., Lavi, N., & Andersen, M. M. (2023). Toys as Teachers: A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Object Use and Enskillment in Hunter--Gatherer Societies. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory, 30, 32--63. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10816-022-09593-3

Studies of cultural transmission—whether approached by archaeological or ethnographic means—have made great strides in identifying formal teaching and learning arrangements, which in turn can be closely aligned with models of social learning. While n... Read More about Toys as Teachers: A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Object Use and Enskillment in Hunter--Gatherer Societies.

The social learning and development of intra-and inter-ethnic sharing norms in the Congo Basin: A registered report protocol (2022)
Journal Article
Pope-Caldwell, S., Lew-Levy, S., Maurits, L., Boyette, A. H., Boyette, A. H., Ellis-Davies, K., Haun, D., Over, H., House, B. R., & House, B. R. (2022). The social learning and development of intra-and inter-ethnic sharing norms in the Congo Basin: A registered report protocol. PLoS ONE, 17(11), e0276845. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0276845

Compared to other species, the extent of human cooperation is unparalleled. Such cooperation is coordinated between community members via social norms. Developmental research has demonstrated that very young children are sensitive to social norms, an... Read More about The social learning and development of intra-and inter-ethnic sharing norms in the Congo Basin: A registered report protocol.

Foraging complexity and the evolution of childhood (2022)
Journal Article
Pretelli, I., Ringen, E., & Lew-Levy, S. (2022). Foraging complexity and the evolution of childhood. Science Advances, 8(41), Article eabn9889. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abn9889

Our species’ long childhood is hypothesized to have evolved as a period for learning complex foraging skills. Researchers studying the development of foraging proficiency have focused on assessing this hypothesis, yet studies present inconsistent con... Read More about Foraging complexity and the evolution of childhood.

Links between household and family social dynamics with sleep profiles among BaYaka foragers of the Congo Basin (2022)
Journal Article
Gettler, L. T., Samson, D. R., Kilius, E., Sarma, M. S., Ouamba, Y. R., Miegakanda, V., …Lew-Levy, S. (2022). Links between household and family social dynamics with sleep profiles among BaYaka foragers of the Congo Basin. Social Science & Medicine, 311, Article 115345. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2022.115345

Given the contributions of sleep to a range of health outcomes, there is substantial interest in ecological and environmental factors, including psychosocial contexts, that shape variation in sleep between individuals and populations. However, the li... Read More about Links between household and family social dynamics with sleep profiles among BaYaka foragers of the Congo Basin.

Socioecology shapes child and adolescent time allocation in twelve hunter-gatherer and mixed-subsistence forager societies (2022)
Journal Article
Lew-Levy, S., Reckin, R., Kissler, S. M., Pretelli, I., Boyette, A. H., Crittenden, A. N., …Davis, H. E. (2022). Socioecology shapes child and adolescent time allocation in twelve hunter-gatherer and mixed-subsistence forager societies. Scientific Reports, 12, Article 8054. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-12217-1

A key issue distinguishing prominent evolutionary models of human life history is whether prolonged childhood evolved to facilitate learning in a skill- and strength-intensive foraging niche requiring high levels of cooperation. Considering the diver... Read More about Socioecology shapes child and adolescent time allocation in twelve hunter-gatherer and mixed-subsistence forager societies.

Hunter-Gatherer Children's Object Play and Tool Use: An Ethnohistorical Analysis (2022)
Journal Article
Lew-Levy, S., Andersen, M. M., Lavi, N., & Riede, F. (2022). Hunter-Gatherer Children's Object Play and Tool Use: An Ethnohistorical Analysis. Frontiers in Psychology, 13, Article 824983. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.824983

Learning to use, make, and modify tools is key to our species’ success. Researchers have hypothesized that play with objects may have a foundational role in the ontogeny of tool use and, over evolutionary timescales, in cumulative technological innov... Read More about Hunter-Gatherer Children's Object Play and Tool Use: An Ethnohistorical Analysis.

Costly teaching contributes to the acquisition of spear hunting skill among BaYaka forager adolescents (2022)
Journal Article
Lew-Levy, S., Bombjaková, D., Milks, A., Kiabiya Ntamboudila, F., Kline, M. A., & Broesch, T. (2022). Costly teaching contributes to the acquisition of spear hunting skill among BaYaka forager adolescents. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 289(1974), Article 20220164. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2022.0164

Teaching likely evolved in humans to facilitate the faithful transmission of complex tasks. As the oldest evidenced hunting technology, spear hunting requires acquiring several complex physical and cognitive competencies. In this study, we used obser... Read More about Costly teaching contributes to the acquisition of spear hunting skill among BaYaka forager adolescents.

A roadmap to doing culturally grounded developmental science (2022)
Journal Article
Broesch, T., Lew-Levy, S., Kärtner, J., Kanngiesser, P., & Kline, M. (2022). A roadmap to doing culturally grounded developmental science. Review of Philosophy and Psychology, 14(2), 587--609. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13164-022-00636-y

Social ties in the Congo Basin: insights into tropical forest adaptation from BaYaka and their neighbours (2022)
Journal Article
Boyette, A. H., Lew-Levy, S., Jang, H., & Kandza, V. (2022). Social ties in the Congo Basin: insights into tropical forest adaptation from BaYaka and their neighbours. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 377(1849), Article 20200490. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2020.0490

Investigating past and present human adaptation to the Congo Basin tropical forest can shed light on how climate and ecosystem variability have shaped human evolution. Here, we first review and synthesize genetic, palaeoclimatological, linguistic and... Read More about Social ties in the Congo Basin: insights into tropical forest adaptation from BaYaka and their neighbours.

Hunter-gatherer children in the past: An archaeological review (2021)
Journal Article
Milks, A., Lew-Levy, S., Lavi, N., Friesem, D. E., & Reckin, R. (2021). Hunter-gatherer children in the past: An archaeological review. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, 64, Article 101369. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaa.2021.101369

Theoretical engagement and methodological innovations geared towards identifying the presence and activities of children in archaeological contexts has increased in pace over the last decade. This paper presents a systematic review of the literature... Read More about Hunter-gatherer children in the past: An archaeological review.

BaYaka adolescent boys nominate accessible adult men as preferred spear hunting models (2021)
Journal Article
Lew-Levy, S., Milks, A., Kiabiya Ntamboudila, F., Broesch, T., & Kline, M. A. (2021). BaYaka adolescent boys nominate accessible adult men as preferred spear hunting models. Current Anthropology, 62(5), 631-640. https://doi.org/10.1086/716853

Humans are selective social learners. In a cultural landscape with many potential models, learners must balance the cost associated with learning from successful models with learning from accessible ones. Using structured interviews, we investigate t... Read More about BaYaka adolescent boys nominate accessible adult men as preferred spear hunting models.

There and back again: The biosocial dynamics of returning from the field (2021)
Journal Article
Sarma, M. S., Gildner, T. E., Howells, M. E., Lew-Levy, S., Trumble, B. C., & Fuentes, A. (2022). There and back again: The biosocial dynamics of returning from the field. American Journal of Human Biology, 34(S1), Article e23673. https://doi.org/10.1002/ajhb.23673

Background
Leaving “home” to pursue fieldwork is a necessity but also a rite of passage for many biological anthropology/human biology scholars. Field-based scientists prepare for the potential changes to activity patterns, sleep schedules, social i... Read More about There and back again: The biosocial dynamics of returning from the field.

How small-scale societies achieve large-scale cooperation (2021)
Journal Article
Glowacki, L., & Lew-Levy, S. (2022). How small-scale societies achieve large-scale cooperation. Current Opinion in Psychology, 44, 44-48. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2021.08.026

For most of our species’ history, humans have lived in relatively small subsistence communities, often called small-scale societies. While these groups lack centralized institutions, they can and often do maintain large-scale cooperation. Here, we ex... Read More about How small-scale societies achieve large-scale cooperation.

Out of the empirical box: A mixed-methods study of tool innovation among Congolese BaYaka forager and Bondongo fisher-farmer children (2021)
Journal Article
Lew-Levy, S., Pope, S. M., Haun, D. B., Kline, M. A., & Broesch, T. (2021). Out of the empirical box: A mixed-methods study of tool innovation among Congolese BaYaka forager and Bondongo fisher-farmer children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 211, Article 105223. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2021.105223

Tool innovation has played a crucial role in human adaptation. Yet, this capacity seems to arise late in development. Before 8 years of age, many children struggle to solve the hook task, a common measure of tool innovation that requires modification... Read More about Out of the empirical box: A mixed-methods study of tool innovation among Congolese BaYaka forager and Bondongo fisher-farmer children.

Gender differences in BaYaka forager sleep-wake patterns in forest and village contexts (2021)
Journal Article
Kilius, E., Samson, D. R., Lew-Levy, S., Sarma, M. S., Patel, U. A., Ouamba, Y. R., …Boyette, A. H. (2021). Gender differences in BaYaka forager sleep-wake patterns in forest and village contexts. Scientific Reports, 11, Article 13658. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-92816-6

Sleep studies in small-scale subsistence societies have broadened our understanding of cross-cultural sleep patterns, revealing the flexibility of human sleep. We examined sleep biology among BaYaka foragers from the Republic of Congo who move betwee... Read More about Gender differences in BaYaka forager sleep-wake patterns in forest and village contexts.

Children's fingernail cortisol among BaYaka foragers of the Congo Basin: associations with fathers' roles (2021)
Journal Article
Gettler, L. T., Lew-Levy, S., Sarma, M. S., Miegakanda, V., Doxsey, M., Meyer, J. S., & Boyette, A. H. (2021). Children's fingernail cortisol among BaYaka foragers of the Congo Basin: associations with fathers' roles. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 376(1827), Article 20200031. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2020.0031

Children and mothers’ cortisol production in response to family psychosocial conditions, including parenting demands, family resource availability and parental conflict, has been extensively studied in the United States and Europe. Less is known abou... Read More about Children's fingernail cortisol among BaYaka foragers of the Congo Basin: associations with fathers' roles.

The Life History of Learning Subsistence Skills among Hadza and BaYaka Foragers from Tanzania and the Republic of Congo (2021)
Journal Article
Lew-Levy, S., Ringen, E. J., Crittenden, A. N., Mabulla, I. A., Broesch, T., & Kline, M. A. (2021). The Life History of Learning Subsistence Skills among Hadza and BaYaka Foragers from Tanzania and the Republic of Congo. Human Nature, 32(1), 16-47. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12110-021-09386-9

Aspects of human life history and cognition, such as our long childhoods and extensive use of teaching, theoretically evolved to facilitate the acquisition of complex tasks. The present paper empirically examines the relationship between subsistence... Read More about The Life History of Learning Subsistence Skills among Hadza and BaYaka Foragers from Tanzania and the Republic of Congo.