Ritual Behavior and the Origin of Modern Cognition

1. Ritual Behavior and the Origin of Modern Cognition

2. Model for Origins of Modern Cognition Mount Toba Anatomically Modern Humans begin to trade New Trading Rituals Trading and Working Memory Ritual Heritability

3. Social Complexity and Cognitive Evolution -Social group size in primates is correlated with size of neocortex -Recent arguments suggest that social selection pressures were the primary reason for the evolution of human intelligence (Brain size increases, Homo expands globally, Megafauna and competitive predators are killed off- Homo is ecologically dominant)

4. Modern Cognition, Working Memory, and Social Selection -modernity is marked by symbolic thinking -working memory is the key

5. Shared Intentionality Definition: a uniquely human ability to share emotional, cognitive, and attentional states and coordinating actions relevant to those states

6. The Toba Eruption -at least 6 years of volcanic winter -Temperatures lowered globally -Very few survivors

7. Archeological Evidence of the Social Solution -!Kung San- modern day hunter-gatherers : trading -Anatomically Modern Humans (AMH) trading 100,000 ybp Tool Trading 70,000 ybp: represents a transformation in trade -Upper Paleolithic AMH 35,000 ybp

8. Why focus on Ritual? Ritual is seen across the animal kingdom Social rituals in primates are often used to build trust and reinforce social relationships Many of our cognitive abilities require ritual

9. Ritual Behavior and Modern Cognition Rappaport’s definition of ritual- the performance of more or less invariant sequences of formal acts and utterances not entirely encoded by the performers Elements include… Performance Formalization Invariance Rule Governance

10. Ritual and Evolution There are 2 reasons why ritual is important for evolution Ritual focuses attention on a particular behavioral or sensory signal at the exclusion of competing signals Ritual inhibits pre-potent defensive responses long enough to allow social emotions and social bonding mechanisms time to operate

11. Late Pleistocene Ritual became important for inter-group and intra-group social bonding Ritual also became very demanding, physically and mentally (stresses)

12. 3 Types of Emergent Rituals Rituals of trust building and reconciliation Rituals of initiation Shamanistic rituals of community and individual healing

13. Rituals of Trust Building -more frequent interactions between groups led to a greater need for trust Example: Yanamamo of the Amazon

14. Rituals of Initiation -70% of traditional societies studied have adolescent rites of passage -the danger of initiation varies, mainly according to the ecological threats Example: Aborigines in Australia

15. Initiations after Toba Eruption -stress from the eruption probably led to the beginning or the intensification of initiation ceremonies Evidence: Upper Paleolithic cave-sites (30,000 ybp) hand adolescent hand and foot prints Example: Native American “Vision Quest” -Rituals and the DLPFC

16. Snake Rock

17. Shamanistic Healing Rituals Shaman- a spiritual emissary who communicates with the supernatural in order to cure the sick, alter the weather and increase overall wellbeing of the tribe -Oldest form of religion, at least in Upper Paleolithic -Further evidence suggesting 35,000 ybp-cave art & 70,000 ybp- snake rock

18. Shamanistic Rituals -involve sensory deprivation, rhythmic drumming, psychoactive substances, dancing and chanting -modern cognition

19. Other Filters for AMH -rituals spurred by environmental pressures of the Toba Eruption were not the only filters for AMH populations Others include… -Vocal and gestural communication Social awareness -Emotional empathy

20. Ritual in Otogeny Performance- the action done to gain the attention of others -begins in infancy as babies imitate their caregivers who hold their attention and engage them in early social interactions often called the infant-mother “dance” -the “dance” involves invariant sequencing and rule governance

21. Sequence of Exchanges Initiation Mutual Orientation Greeting Play Dialogue -protoconversations

22. Ritual and Social Cognitive Development -learning to interpret emotions Example: peek-a-boo games -Social referencing

23. Infants learn to… Regulate their emotions Use their social partner as an information source for evaluating experience Use the ritual framework to interpret events and emotions

24. Raising Children after Toba -Adept Mothers = greater reproductive success -Children grew up and became adept Fathers and Mothers -Baldwinian Process- environmentally induced somatic modifications become heritable Example: Belyaev’s fox experiments -that which initially emerged as a somatic change became heritable