Testing the Cognitive and Cultural Niche Theories of Human Evolution

The cognitive niche and the cultural niche are two competing theories of human evolution. One point over which they disagree is the importance of gene-culture interactions. Here, I use three models to evaluate this disagreement: (i) an asocial baseline model; (ii) a model of the cognitive niche, which includes a form of social learning that prevents gene-culture coevolution; and (iii) a model of the cultural niche, which allows gene-culture coevolution. Intelligence can evolve in all three models, and social transmission increases the range of conditions under which it can do so. However, only the model of the cultural niche (i) produces periods of evolutionary stasis, (ii) produces a positive relationship between population size and the rate of cultural and genetic evolution, and (iii) results in behaviors that are difficult to discover dominating the population. I review the available evidence for such patterns in human evolution and conclude that the cultural niche provides a more comprehensive explanation for human evolution than does the cognitive niche.