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X-WR-CALDESC:Events for Center for Behavior, Evolution, and Culture
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20080204T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20080204T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T214024Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004835Z
UID:4063-1202083200-1202083200@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Aaron Blaisdell - Intervention and Causal Inferences in Rats
DESCRIPTION:Aaron Blaisdell: UCLA Psychology and Brain Research InstituteI report a series of experiments showing that rats appear to make causal inferences in a basic task that taps\ninto core features of causal reasoning. (1) They derived predictions of the outcomes of interventions after\npassive observational learning of different kinds of causal models. After learning through Pavlovian\nobservation that Event A was a common cause of Events X and Food (XßAàFood)\, rats predicted Food when\npresented with Event X as a cue but discounted the alternative cause A when they generated X by means of a\nlever press. (2) Rats showed evidence of reality monitoring. After learning an XàAàFood causal chain where\nX was a tone and A was a light\, when tested on X rats expected A to occur. But when A did not occur during\ntesting\, rats did not expect food. By hiding the light during testing on X\, however\, rats showed no disruption of\nfood expectancy\, suggesting that rats understood that A was unobservable. (3) Finally\, we present evidence\nthat rats treated their actions as special in causal learning. Discounting of a previous cause was only\nobserved with interventions but not with other observable events; rats were capable of flexibly switching\nbetween observational and interventional predictions; and discounting occurred on the very first test trial.\nThese results confirm causal-model theory but refute associative theories.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/Blaisdell_Paper.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/aaron-blaisdell-intervention-and-causal-inferences-in-rats/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20080128T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20080128T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T214023Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004835Z
UID:4062-1201478400-1201478400@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Mark Collard - Risk and technological innovation in small-scale societies
DESCRIPTION:Mark Collard: Simon Fraser University Archaeology
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/mark-collard-risk-and-technological-innovation-in-small-scale-societies/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20080114T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20080114T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213929Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004835Z
UID:4061-1200268800-1200268800@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Afzal Upal - Do we have religion because evolution favors opportunistic learners?
DESCRIPTION:Afzal Upal: OccidentalCognitive anthropologists such as Pascal Boyer have argued that religious concepts are minimally\ncounterintuitive and that this gives them mnemic advantages. I will ague that people have the memory\narchitecture that results in such concepts being more memorable because it makes them better learners\nwhich gives them an evolutionary edge over their competitors.  I will show how such benefits emerge in the\nreal-time processing of comprehending narratives such as folk tales. This model suggests that memorability\nis not an inherent property of a concept as Boyer appears to assume; rather it is a property of the concept\, the\ncontext in which the concept is presented\, and the background knowledge that the comprehendor possesses\nabout the concept. The model predicts how memorability of a concept should change if the context containing\nthe concept were changed. I will also present the results of experiments carried out to test these predictions.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/Upal_Paper.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/afzal-upal-do-we-have-religion-because-evolution-favors-opportunistic-learners/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20080107T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20080107T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213929Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004836Z
UID:4060-1199664000-1199664000@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Roger Sullivan - Revealing the paradox of drug reward in human evolution
DESCRIPTION:Roger Sullivan: CSU Sacramento\, Anthropology\, and UC Davis School of Medicine\,\nPsychiatry and Behavioral SciencesNeurobiological models of drug abuse propose that drug use is initiated and maintained by\nrewarding feedback mechanisms. However\, most commonly used drugs are plant neurotoxins\nthat evolved to punish\, not reward\, consumption by animal herbivores. Reward models therefore\nimplicitly assume an evolutionary mismatch between recent drug-profligate environments\nand a relatively drug-free past in which a reward center\, incidentally vulnerable to neurotoxins\,\ncould evolve. In contrast\, emerging insights from plant evolutionary ecology and the genetics\nof hepatic enzymes\, particularly cytochrome P450\, indicate that animal and hominid taxa have\nbeen exposed to plant toxins throughout their evolution. Specifically\, evidence of conserved\nfunction\, stabilizing selection\, and population-specific selection of human cytochrome P450\ngenes indicate recent evolutionary exposure to plant toxins\, including those that affect animal\nnervous systems. Thus\, the human propensity to seek out and consume plant neurotoxins\nis a paradox with far-reaching implications for current drug-reward theory. We sketch some\npotential resolutions of the paradox\, including the possibility that humans may have evolved\nto counter-exploit plant neurotoxins. Resolving the paradox of drug reward will require a\nsynthesis of ecological and neurobiological perspectives of drug seeking and use.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/Sullivan.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/roger-sullivan-revealing-the-paradox-of-drug-reward-in-human-evolution/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071203T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071203T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213928Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004836Z
UID:4059-1196640000-1196640000@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Michael Arbib - New Sign Languages and Language Evolution
DESCRIPTION:Michael Arbib: USC NeuroscienceHuman language is far more than speech and its derivatives such as writing. Human signed languages like\nAmerican Sign Language are fully expressive human languages\, and speakers normally accompany their\nspeech with facial and manual gestures. Thus any theory of language evolution must address these integral\nroles that manual signs and gestures play today. What are the capabilities of the human brain that make it\npossible for humans to learn language while other creatures can not? How much structure must the social\nenvironment offer a child to acquire language? We probe these questions by studying two sign languages of\nrecent vintage. Nicaraguan Sign anguage developed in just 25 years while Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language\ndeveloped over at most 70 years\, and are still developing. We examine the emergence and dynamics of these\nlanguages to advance discussion of what supports society offered to allow these communities to exploit the\nhuman brain’s readiness for language in novel ways.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/ArbibPaper.doc
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/michael-arbib-new-sign-languages-and-language-evolution/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071126T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071126T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213927Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004836Z
UID:4058-1196035200-1196035200@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Russ Poldrack - How\, and what\, can neuroimaging tell us about the mind?
DESCRIPTION:Russ Poldrack: UCLA PsychologyIt has become common practice amongst neuroimaging researchers to infer the presence of mental\nprocesses from activation in particular parts of the brain.  The validity of this practice\, which I refer to as\n“reverse inference”\, depends upon how selectively specific brain regions are associated with specific mental\nprocesses. I will present evidence suggesting that these associations are often weak\, providing little\nevidence in favor of the reverse inference.  I will also discuss general strategies by which one can use\nneuroimaging to inform theories of mental processes.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/russ-poldrack-how-and-what-can-neuroimaging-tell-us-about-the-mind/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071119T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071119T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213925Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004836Z
UID:4057-1195430400-1195430400@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Richard Lippa - Sex Differences in Sexuality\, Personality\, and Cognitive Abilities across 53 Nations:\nProbing Evolutionary and Sociocultural Explanations
DESCRIPTION:Richard Lippa: Cal State University\, Fullerton Department of PsychologyBBC data from 53 nations and from more than 200\,000 participants provide new insights into sex differences\nin: (1) sexual traits (e.g.\, sex drive and sociosexuality)\, (2) mate preferences (e.g.\, the value assigned to\nphysical attractiveness\, intelligence\, honesty in a mate)\, (3) personality traits (e.g.\, extraversion\,\nagreeableness\, neuroticism\, people-versus-thing orientation)\, and (4) cognitive abilities (mental rotation\nability\, line angle judgment ability).  Predictions that follow from social role theory—e.g.\, that sex differences\nwill be larger in countries with stronger gender roles—received little support in the BBC data. In contrast\,\npredictions that follow from evolutionary theories—e.g.\, that there will be consistent sex differences across\nnations\, which do not covary with nations’ levels of gender equality—received support for many of the\nassessed sex differences. Results for sociosexuality (sex differences were larger in patriarchal than in\ngender-egalitarian nations\, and women’s sociosexuality varied more across nations than men’s did) were\nconsistent with a hybrid model—that cultural factors influence women’s sociosexuality more than men’s and\nare superimposed on biologically-based sex differences.  Results for sex differences in trait SDs (e.g.\, across\nnations\, women varied more than men did in sex drive and extraversion; men varied more than women did in\nagreeableness and mental rotation scores) also tended to support biological theories over social structural\ntheories\, except in the case of sociosexuality\, where results were consistent with a hybrid model that\nassumed cultural influences superimposed on biological predispositions: for sociosexuality\, men were more\nvariable than women in patriarchal countries\, but the reverse was true in gender-egalitarian countries.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/Lippa_sex_drive_and_sociosexuality_UCLA%5B1%5D.doc
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/richard-lippa-sex-differences-in-sexuality-personality-and-cognitive-abilities-across-53-nationsprobing-evolutionary-and-sociocultural-explanations/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071105T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071105T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213920Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004836Z
UID:4056-1194220800-1194220800@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Kerri Johnson - Gender Counts: Why perceptions of masculinity and femininity are as important as the cues that convey them
DESCRIPTION:Kerri Johnson: UCLA Communication StudiesIn the 1950s\, Doris Troy famously sang\, “Just one look…that’s all it took\,” implying that attraction can begin\nwith little more than a glance.  Contemporary research in person construal generally corroborates this\nobservation\, but debate continues about precisely how physical cues come to convey attractiveness.  One\nunresolved question centers on whether objective indices of masculinity and femininity predict perceived\nattractiveness.  Attempts to answer this question have been frustrated by contradictory results.  In this talk\, I\nwill argue that masculinity and femininity are better defined as subjective judgments of the gender-typicality of\na trait\, not as objective indices of sexual dimorphism.  I will present data suggesting that once sex\ncategorization has occurred\, sexually dimorphic traits are interpreted to be either masculine or feminine\, the\ntypicality of which strongly predicts perceptions of attractiveness.  Masculine men and feminine women are\nperceived as attractive; feminine men and masculine women are not.  This perspective has several important\nimplications.  First\, this perspective implies that the accuracy or error in the cognitive representations of sexual\ndimorphism will systematically skew gender judgments and thereby affect perceived attractiveness.  At times\,\nthis may result in preferences that appear quite extreme by objective standards.  At other times\, this may even\nyield preferences for traits that are gender atypical by objective standards.  Second\, this perspective\nacknowledges the importance of cultural and ecological factors as moderators of the relation between cues\nand attractiveness.  Perceptions of masculinity/femininity are likely to vary systematically with culture and\necology\, and perceived attractiveness should vary accordingly.  In sum\, my talk will describe how perceptions\nof masculinity and femininity provide the evaluative interpretation of biologically relevant cues – engendering\nrapid and ready judgments of attractiveness from “just one look.”http://www.bec.ucla.edu/Johnson&Tassinary(2007).pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/kerri-johnson-gender-counts-why-perceptions-of-masculinity-and-femininity-are-as-important-as-the-cues-that-convey-them/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071029T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071029T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213919Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004836Z
UID:4055-1193616000-1193616000@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Rob Kurzban - Morality is (at least) a Three-Player Game
DESCRIPTION:Rob Kurzban: Penn PsychologySubstantial debate remains about the ultimate and proximate explanations for why people choose to punish\nthird parties\, individuals involved in interactions that have had and will have no direct effect on the punisher.\nHere\, one particular type of third-party punishment is explored\, moralistic punishment\, enduring a cost to inflict\ncosts on an individual who has violated a perceived moral norm. Results from a series of experiments\nsuggest that 1) third-party punishment\, at least in these cases\, is considerably less frequent and smaller in\nmagnitude than would be expected from existing models\, 2) knowing that one will be observed in meting out\nmoralistic punishment increases individuals’ willingness to do so\, and 3) inducing emotions such as\nempathy has systematic effects on both moralistic punishment and compensating victims of moral wrongs.\nThese findings are discussed in the context of  possible evolved functions of moral psychology\, focusing on\nthe centrality of moralistic punishment for understanding the nature of the moral game being played.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/rob-kurzban-morality-is-at-least-a-three-player-game/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071022T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071022T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213918Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004837Z
UID:4054-1193011200-1193011200@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Andrew Shaner - Age at onset of schizophrenia: Evidence of a latitudinal gradient
DESCRIPTION:Andrew Shaner: UCLA VA HospitalVariation in the age at onset of a multifactorial disease often reflects variation in cause.  In this talk\, I show a linear latitudinal gradient in the mean age at onset of schizophrenia in 13 northern-hemisphere cities\, ranging from 25 years old in Cali\, Columbia (at 4 degrees north) to 35 years old in Moscow\, Russia (at 56 degrees north).  This striking association has not been previously reported.  I consider several explanations\, including the effects of pathogen stress\, natural selection\, sexual selection\, migration\, life-history profiles\, or some combination of these factors\, and I propose a test of competing causal hypotheses.http://bec.ucla.edu/papers/Shaner07.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/andrew-shaner-age-at-onset-of-schizophrenia-evidence-of-a-latitudinal-gradient/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071015T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071015T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213917Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004837Z
UID:4053-1192406400-1192406400@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Gian Gonzaga - Is there an "I" in "We"?
DESCRIPTION:Gian Gonzaga: eHarmony.comRelationships are often studied through one of two questions. How does the relationship benefit the individual and/or how does the relationship benefit the dyad? This talk will address the challenges of balancing what is good for me\, what is good for my partner\, and what is good for the relationship. It will then review a series of studies that shows that self-interest is sometimes best served by promoting the success of the relationship\, even at the momentary expense of the self.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/gian-gonzaga-is-there-an-i-in-we/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071008T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071008T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213916Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004837Z
UID:4052-1191801600-1191801600@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Mary Towner - Investigating cultural macroevolution and trait transmission in the Western North American Indian database
DESCRIPTION:Mary Towner: UC Davis Department of AnthropologyCultural traits are distributed across human societies in a patterned way. Study of the mechanisms whereby\ncultural traits persist and change over time is key to understanding human cultural diversity. For more than a\ncentury\, a central question has engaged anthropologists interested in the study of cultural trait variation—what\nis the source of cultural variation? More precisely\, are cultural traits transmitted primarily from ancestral to\ndescendant populations (through vertical transmission or inheritance) or between contemporary\, typically\nneighboring\, populations (through horizontal transmission or diffusion)\, or do they emerge as independent\ninnovations? In addition\, do traits in different domains\, such as kinship and family\, subsistence and\nsettlement\, or material culture\, show different transmission patterns? Addressing such questions has proven\nto be methodologically challenging. Drawing on a research collaboration with Dr. Monique Borgerhoff Mulder\nand Dr. Mark N. Grote\, I will show how autologistic models can overcome some of the limitations of previous\napproaches by placing the different transmission mechanisms on a more equal analytical footing. These\nmodels can explicitly incorporate the structural links between societies\, with geographical proximity being\nused as a proxy for horizontal transmission\, and linguistic classification being used as a proxy for vertical\ntransmission. I illustrate the method with an application to cross-cultural data from the Western North\nAmerican Indian database\, a sample of 172 societies for which detailed ethnographic surveys were\nconducted in the early 20th century. Alternative autologistic models are estimated through MCMC simulations\nand then compared based on Akaike Information Criterion. The results suggest that the best models will\nalmost always incorporate both vertical and horizontal processes.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/mary-towner-investigating-cultural-macroevolution-and-trait-transmission-in-the-western-north-american-indian-database/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071001T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20071001T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221645
CREATED:20200922T213903Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004837Z
UID:4051-1191196800-1191196800@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Mark Kleiman - Maximizing cooperation while minimizing punishment
DESCRIPTION:Mark Kleiman: UCLA Department of Public PolicyThe threat of punishment can facilitate cooperation by discouraging defection and aggression. Because punishment is scarce\, costly\, and painful\, optimal enforcement strategies will minimize the amount of actual punishment required to effectuate deterrence. If potential offenders are deterrable\, increasing the conditional probability of punishment (given violation) can reduce the amount of punishment actually inflicted\, by “tipping” a situation from its high-violation equilibrium to its low-violation equilibrium. Compared to random or “equal opportunity” enforcement\, dynamically concentrated sanctions can reduce the punishment level necessary to tip the system.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/kleimanpaper.doc
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/mark-kleiman-maximizing-cooperation-while-minimizing-punishment/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070807T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070807T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213855Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004837Z
UID:4043-1186444800-1186444800@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Hanna Kokko - Love and hatred in a world of feedback
DESCRIPTION:Hanna Kokko: University of Helsinki Department of Biological and Environmental SciencesI will present results on both `love´ (sexual selection) and `hatred´ (territorial conflict). In both cases I will investigate the role of `feedback´\, that is\, ask the question how strongly individual behaviour influences population dynamics\, which then feeds back to influence what is adaptive at the individual level. We know that selection does not favour what is good for a group (or species)\, but do we ask often enough how `bad´ it can get? For example\, are sexually selected species expected to be particularly prone to extinction? And\, does territoriality in the Seychelles magpie robin (that only this year got its status lifted from critically endangered to endangered) increase its vulnerability to environmental change?http://www.bec.ucla.edu/papers/Kokko_1.29.07.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/hanna-kokko-love-and-hatred-in-a-world-of-feedback/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070604T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070604T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213838Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004837Z
UID:4031-1180915200-1180915200@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Alison Gopnik - Causal maps and Bayes nets: Causal inference and theory formation in children\, scientists and computers
DESCRIPTION:Alison Gopnik: UC Berkeley Department of PsychologyHow do we accurately infer the causal structure of the world around us? Thirty years of developmental research has shown that human children form and revise intuitive theories of everyday physics\, biology and psychology. These theories are similar to the formal theories of science. Recent work in philosophy of science\, computer science and statistics has developed formal computational models of this kind of theory formation\, particularly in the framework of causal graphical models or Bayes nets. I’ll argue that we can think of intuitive theories as causal maps\, analogous to the spatial maps animals use in navigation. These maps allow us to consider counterfactual alternatives\, design complex plans and act to change our environments\, and they may be uniquely human. I will present evidence showing that preschool children construct such maps in ways that accord with the Bayes net formalism.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/papers/Gopnik_4.6.07.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/alison-gopnik-causal-maps-and-bayes-nets-causal-inference-and-theory-formation-in-children-scientists-and-computers/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070521T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070521T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213837Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004837Z
UID:4030-1179705600-1179705600@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Stacey Rucas - Allies and Rivals: The Complex world of women's social dynamics among the Tsimane of Bolivia
DESCRIPTION:Stacey Rucas: California Polytechnic State University Department of Social SciencesThis research examines the complexity of women’s social behaviors with other women through various modes of evolutionary inquiry and methods. Results indicate that women engage in alternating forms of competitive and cooperative behaviors across the lifecourse in their quest for reproductively limiting resources. Data presented will highlight several avenues of research conducted with the Tsimane that attempt to identify contested resources\, track their exchanges\, and understand the use of social aggression to secure status and compete (or cooperate) for friends\, mates and food within female social networks.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/stacey-rucas-allies-and-rivals-the-complex-world-of-womens-social-dynamics-among-the-tsimane-of-bolivia/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070514T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070514T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213836Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004838Z
UID:4029-1179100800-1179100800@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Carl Lipo - Resolution of the Cultural Phylogenies of Monumental Statues on Easter Island
DESCRIPTION:Carl Lipo: CSU Long Beach Department of AnthropologyThe monumental statues (moai) of Easter Island represent substantial investment in cultural elaboration by the prehistoric islanders. Constructing explanations of these features requires generating measurements of temporal and spatial statue variability. Using a method based in cultural transmission\, cladistics and occurrence seriation I present the results of analysis that potentially reflects a phylogeny of the monumental statues. This work enables the evaluation of models of statue change in which diversity of styles and materials produces patterns of lineages and the general form of an explanatory model for the evolution of culture elaboration on this famous island.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/carl-lipo-resolution-of-the-cultural-phylogenies-of-monumental-statues-on-easter-island/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070507T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070507T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213836Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004838Z
UID:4028-1178496000-1178496000@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Janet Sinsheimer - Family Feuds: Maternal-Fetal Genotype Incompatibility
DESCRIPTION:Janet Sinsheimer: UCLA Departments of Human Genetics\, Biomathematics and BiostatisticsBiological mechanisms involving a combination of genetic and environmental factors have been hypothesized to explain susceptibility to complex familial\ndisease. I will present our efforts to detect interactions between mother’s and child’s genes that may create adverse prenatal environments and increase susceptibility to diseases such as schizophrenia and rheumatoid arthritis.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/papers/Sinsheimer_5.7.07a.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/janet-sinsheimer-family-feuds-maternal-fetal-genotype-incompatibility/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070430T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070430T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213835Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004838Z
UID:4027-1177891200-1177891200@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:James Roney - Preliminary data testing an alternative explanation for menstrual phase effects on women's mate preferences
DESCRIPTION:James Roney: UC Santa Barbara Department of PsychologyMenstrual cycle shifts in women’s mate preferences have generally been interpreted as products of adaptations designed to alter behavior during the fertile window relative to other times in the cycle. I will discuss an alternative theory that posits that such shifts may be produced by mechanisms designed to use ovarian hormone concentrations to calibrate behaviors across different menstrual cycles. I will then present preliminary data showing that women’s estradiol concentrations correlate positively with their preferences for facial cues of men’s testosterone concentrations\, and that this relationship holds during times of the cycle that are outside the fertile window. These data do not argue definitively for either position but do at least suggest the plausibility of the between-cycle alternative explanation.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/james-roney-preliminary-data-testing-an-alternative-explanation-for-menstrual-phase-effects-on-womens-mate-preferences/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070425T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070425T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213822Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004838Z
UID:4026-1177459200-1177459200@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Nicola S. Clayton - Memories of Tomorrow:\nDo Animals Remember the Past and Plan for the Future?
DESCRIPTION:Nicola S. Clayton: University of Cambridge Department of Experimental PsychologyAccording to the mental time travel hypothesis only humans can mentally dissociate themselves from the present\, travelling backwards in time to recollect specific past events about what happened where and when (episodic memory) and travelling forwards in time to anticipate future needs (future planning). Studies on the behaviour of food-caching western scrub-jays question this assumption. In terms of retrospective cognition\, these birds remember the ‘what\, where and when’ of specific past caching episodes\, they keep track of how long ago they cached different types of perishable foods that decay at different rates\, and also remember whether another individual was present at the time of caching\, and if so\, which bird was watching when. Recent work demonstrates that the jays also make provision for a future need\, caching more food in places in which they will not be given breakfast the next morning than in places where they will be receive breakfast the next morning even though there is plenty of food available to them when they cache the food. Taken together these results challenge the mental time travel hypothesis by showing that some elements of both retrospective and prospective mental time travel appear not to be uniquely human.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/papers/Clayton_4.25.07a.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/nicola-s-clayton-memories-of-tomorrowdo-animals-remember-the-past-and-plan-for-the-future/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070423T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070423T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213822Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004838Z
UID:4025-1177286400-1177286400@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Joan Silk - Sex Ratio: Local Resource Competition and Local Resource Enhancement
DESCRIPTION:Joan Silk: UCLA Department of Anthropology
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/joan-silk-sex-ratio-local-resource-competition-and-local-resource-enhancement/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070416T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070416T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213821Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004838Z
UID:4024-1176681600-1176681600@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Caitlin O'Connell-Rodwell - The Importance of Communication and Culture to the African Elephant
DESCRIPTION:Caitlin O’Connell-Rodwell: Stanford University Department of Otolaryngology\, Head and Neck SurgeryThe structure of African elephant society is primarily matriarchal in nature\, where dominant female elephants make decisions for the herd as a whole with regard to safety\, movements\, resource choices and affiliations. Culture is often influenced by local environmental and social pressures\, as well as the character of individual herd members. Aspects of elephant society that contribute to survival will be discussed in the context of mechanisms that elephants employ to communicate over long distances. In addition\, new findings about elephant bull society will be reviewed\, highlighting the importance of bonding and mentoring adolescent delinquent males.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/papers/OConnellRodwell_4.16.07.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/caitlin-oconnell-rodwell-the-importance-of-communication-and-culture-to-the-african-elephant/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070409T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070409T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213821Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004839Z
UID:4023-1176076800-1176076800@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Hillard Kaplan - The human adaptive complex and the evolution of the 70 year lifespan
DESCRIPTION:Hillard Kaplan: University of New Mexico Department of AnthropologyThis paper will present an overview of age-specific mortality rates among hunter-gatherers and forager-horticulturalists. It will also present new data on resource transfers and physical rates of aging among Tsimane forager-horticulturalists in Bolivia. It will be argued that the balance of costs and benefits of maintenance and repair of the human soma have resulted in a modal adult age at death of 70 or so years. Seven decades of life may be considered the evolved species-typical lifespan of Homo sapiens.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/hillard-kaplan-the-human-adaptive-complex-and-the-evolution-of-the-70-year-lifespan/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070402T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070402T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213820Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004839Z
UID:4022-1175472000-1175472000@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Paul Griffiths - The Baldwin effect and genetic assimilation
DESCRIPTION:Paul Griffiths: University of Queensland Department of PhilosophyMany evolutionary processes have been described in which a trait that initially develops in the members of a population as a result of some interaction with the environment comes to develop without that interaction in their descendants. Waddington’s genetic assimilation is importantly different from the rest of this ‘Baldwiniana’ because his explanatory focus was not on the selection pressures at the point of transition\, but on how developmental systems come to be structured in such a way that these evolutionary transitions are readily accessible to evolving lineages. Waddington’s approach also replaces the simple contrast between ‘acquired’ and ‘innate’ with a non-dichotomous model of developmental canalisation and phenotypic plasticity that is in line with recent work on the evolution of development. From a Waddingtonian perspective evolutionary transitions between ‘innate’ and ‘acquired’ are only to be expected because those categories have little meaning in terms of developmental genetics and in some cases the difference between the ‘innate’ and ‘acquired’ may require only a minimal change in developmental mechanisms. But to see this it is necessary to use a gene concept suitable for thinking about development\, and not a gene concept designed for theoretical population genetics or for the prediction of phenotypic differences within populations.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/papers/Griffiths_2.4.07.doc
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/paul-griffiths-the-baldwin-effect-and-genetic-assimilation/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070319T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070319T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213902Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004839Z
UID:4050-1174262400-1174262400@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Daniel J. Kruger - Sexual selection\, male competition\, and sex differences in human mortality rates
DESCRIPTION:Daniel J. Kruger: University of Michigan School of Public HealthSex differences in human mortality rates stem from genetic\, physiological\, behavioral\, and social causes that are best understood when integrated in an evolutionary life history framework. Males in many species are selected for riskier physiological and behavioral strategies that enhance reproductive success at the expense of health and longevity. Sex differences shaped by sexual selection interact with the environment to yield a pattern with some consistency\, but also with expected variations due to socioeconomic and other factors. This presentation investigates the notion that sex differences in human mortality rates are related to levels of male competition for resources\, social status\, and mates\, and that the actual or potential degree of skew in resource control will influence the degree of male competition and excess male mortality.http://www.bec.ucla.edu/papers/Kruger_3.19.07.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/daniel-j-kruger-sexual-selection-male-competition-and-sex-differences-in-human-mortality-rates/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070312T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070312T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213902Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004839Z
UID:4049-1173657600-1173657600@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Brenda Bowser - Learning and Transmission of Pottery Style: Women's Life Histories and Communities of Practice in the Ecuadorian Amazon
DESCRIPTION:Brenda Bowser: Cal State Fullerton Department of AnthropologyThis paper examines the transmission of stylistic behavior in the community of Conambo. The people of Conambo are self-sufficient horticultural foragers who are strongly divided into two competing coalitions with flexible membership and defections across the coalitional boundary. The women of Conambo maintain a domestic polychrome ceramic tradition absent from external market influences. Previous studies show that pottery design in Conambo is understood and used strategically as a marker of group membership. In this paper we report age and status differences in perception and transmission of stylistic behavior\, indicating that women’s pottery style and strategies of signification track life-history changes in their political relationships with in-group and out-group allies. We argue that in Conambo the transmission of ceramic design is influenced by the political strategies of women throughout their lives.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/brenda-bowser-learning-and-transmission-of-pottery-style-womens-life-histories-and-communities-of-practice-in-the-ecuadorian-amazon/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070305T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070305T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213901Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004839Z
UID:4048-1173052800-1173052800@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Bernard Comrie - Vertical and horizontal transmission of language structure
DESCRIPTION:Bernard Comrie: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology Department of Linguistics & UC Santa Barbara Department of LinguisticsAn understanding of the transmission of language across time requires reference to both vertical transmission – for instance\, the English word “father” is a direct inheritance from the ancestral language Proto-Indo-European – and horizontal transmission – “paternal” was taken from Latin in the medieval period. This applies not only to vocabulary but also to language structure (grammar). The recently completed project The World Atlas of Language Structures (www.wals.info) for the first time provides the possibility of investigating such relations in detail. The talk will refer specifically to structural features that seem more amenable to either vertical or horizontal transmission\, and include discussion of linguistic areas like Southeast Asia that result from widespread horizontal transmission and of the kinds of historical signals that can be detected in comparing structural information from languages of sub-Saharan Africa.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/bernard-comrie-vertical-and-horizontal-transmission-of-language-structure/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070226T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070226T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213900Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004839Z
UID:4047-1172448000-1172448000@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Susan Carey - The Origin of Concepts: The Case of Natural Number
DESCRIPTION:Susan Carey: Harvard Department of PsychologyI make two non-controversial assumptions about human conceptual understanding. First\, it is built from a shared set of developmental primitives–the representational resources bequeathed to all human beings by evolution. Equally obviously\, human cultures create new representational resources\, transcending these initial ones in format\, content and expressive power\, which are turn internalized by individuals in the course of conceptual development. These assumptions\, even if granted\, leave open radically different possibilities concerning the processes of conceptual development and the scope for cross-cultural variation. How rich are the developmental primitives? How constraining of adult cognition are they? Does human conceptual development require transcending the initial state\, and if so\, what mechanisms make this possible? . \nI will illustrate an empirical research program addressing this space of theoretical options in the domain of numerical cognition\, focusing on the developmental primitives with numerical content\, the cultural construction of integer representations\, and the bootstrapping processes that allow each child to transcend their initial representational resources\, creating representations of natural number.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/susan-carey-the-origin-of-concepts-the-case-of-natural-number/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070215T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070215T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213857Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004840Z
UID:4046-1171497600-1171497600@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Karl Sigmund - Between freedom and enforcement: public goods and costly punishment
DESCRIPTION:Karl Sigmund: University of Vienna Department of MathematicsA considerable body of theoretical and empirical evidence underlines the important role of punishment in stabilising high contributions to joint enterprises. But how does punishing behaviour emerge? This talk highlights the role of voluntary participation. Analytical methods and individual-based simulations show that social norms including the punishment of exploiters can emerge more easily if it is possible to abstain from the joint enterprise.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/karl-sigmund-between-freedom-and-enforcement-public-goods-and-costly-punishment/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070212T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20070212T000000
DTSTAMP:20260504T221646
CREATED:20200922T213856Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004840Z
UID:4045-1171238400-1171238400@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Pascal Boyer - Why do patients and religious people perform rituals?
DESCRIPTION:Pascal Boyer: Washington University Department of PsychologyRitualized behavior is found in children’s typical development\, as well as in the pathology of OCD and in cultural ceremonies. Pierrre Lienard and I proposed elsewhere a neurocognitive model of ritualized behavior in human development and pathology\, as based on the activation of a specific hazard-precaution system specialized in the detection of and response to potential threats. I argue that certain features of collective rituals‹by conveying information about potential danger and presenting appropriate reaction as a sequence of rigidly described precautionary measures‹probably activate this neurocognitive system. This makes some collective ritual sequences highly attention-demanding and intuitively compelling and contributes to their transmission from place to place or generation to generation.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/pascal-boyer-why-do-patients-and-religious-people-perform-rituals/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR