V. Natural Selection and Learning
a. Value of the ability to learn
The cultural intelligence model agrees with the following statements: (1) social learning is more efficient that individual learning and (2) animals prefer social learning (Castro & Toro, 2004; Laland 2004; van Schaik and Burkart, 2001). Individual learning was deemed to be more costly. Social learning allows the individual to save energy and time in trial and error learning and learn from the experience of others. This process also allows the individual to acquire a behavior or skill faster than it would through individual exploration (van Schaik & Berkart, 2001). In control groups of many experiments, control animals (who must figure something out independently) fail to …show more content…
This has been demonstrated to be evident in the above sections. Beyond this selection for learning, there is also selection for the ability to judge the information being given. Copying other individuals without evaluation or discretion is not an adaptive behavior and will not increase the fitness of the population over time (Laland, 2014). One must be selective with the knowledge they incorporate in their lifetime. Laland demonstrated that game theory and population genetic models support the idea that social learning is discriminatory and thus becomes adaptive (Laland, 2014). Castro and Toro (2004) discussed that though the dual inheritance model and gene-culture coevolution to suggest that imitation is a key factor that can explain the transformation of primate social learning that occurred during hominization, imitation is not enough to cause this homogenization process; cognitive investment is also involved (Castro & Toro, 2004). Imitation simply copies behavior without reinvention which means there is no adaptive significance. Infant chimpanzees without role models have reduced physical skills to help it survive, such as nest building and tool use, then those with role models (Castro & Toro,
a. Value of the ability to learn
The cultural intelligence model agrees with the following statements: (1) social learning is more efficient that individual learning and (2) animals prefer social learning (Castro & Toro, 2004; Laland 2004; van Schaik and Burkart, 2001). Individual learning was deemed to be more costly. Social learning allows the individual to save energy and time in trial and error learning and learn from the experience of others. This process also allows the individual to acquire a behavior or skill faster than it would through individual exploration (van Schaik & Berkart, 2001). In control groups of many experiments, control animals (who must figure something out independently) fail to …show more content…
This has been demonstrated to be evident in the above sections. Beyond this selection for learning, there is also selection for the ability to judge the information being given. Copying other individuals without evaluation or discretion is not an adaptive behavior and will not increase the fitness of the population over time (Laland, 2014). One must be selective with the knowledge they incorporate in their lifetime. Laland demonstrated that game theory and population genetic models support the idea that social learning is discriminatory and thus becomes adaptive (Laland, 2014). Castro and Toro (2004) discussed that though the dual inheritance model and gene-culture coevolution to suggest that imitation is a key factor that can explain the transformation of primate social learning that occurred during hominization, imitation is not enough to cause this homogenization process; cognitive investment is also involved (Castro & Toro, 2004). Imitation simply copies behavior without reinvention which means there is no adaptive significance. Infant chimpanzees without role models have reduced physical skills to help it survive, such as nest building and tool use, then those with role models (Castro & Toro,