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Cultural differentiation does not entail group-level structure: The case for geographically explicit analysis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 March 2016

Robert Malcolm Ross  and
Quentin Douglas Atkinson
Robert Malcolm Ross
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham, Surry TW20 0EX, United Kingdom. [email protected]://www.ccd.edu.au/people/profile.php?memberID=595 ARC Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders, and Department of Cognitive Science, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW 2109, Australia.
Quentin Douglas Atkinson
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1142, New Zealand. [email protected]://www.fos.auckland.ac.nz/~quentinatkinson/Quentin_Atkinsons_Website/Home.html Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, D-07745 Jena, Germany.
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Abstract

Richerson et al. argue that relatively large cultural FST values provide evidence for group structure and therefore scope for group selection. However, recent research on spatial patterns of cultural variation demonstrates that, as in the genetic case, apparent group structure can be a consequence of geographic clines, not group barriers. Such a pattern limits the scope for cultural group selection.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 39 , 2016 , e49
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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