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Cultural innovation is not only a product of cognition but also of cultural context

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 January 2025

Yotam Ben-Oren ,
Erella Hovers ,
Oren Kolodny  and
Nicole Creanza Open the ORCID record for Nicole Creanza [Opens in a new window]
Yotam Ben-Oren*
Affiliation:
Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior, Silberman Institute for Life Science, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel Yotam.ben-oren@mail.huji.ac.il Oren.kolodny@mail.huji.ac.il; https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=PxhzC24AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao; https://sites.google.com/view/oren-kolodny-homepage
Erella Hovers
Affiliation:
Institute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel Hovers@mail.huji.ac.il; https://archaeology.huji.ac.il/people/erella-hovers
Oren Kolodny
Affiliation:
Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior, Silberman Institute for Life Science, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel Yotam.ben-oren@mail.huji.ac.il Oren.kolodny@mail.huji.ac.il; https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=PxhzC24AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao; https://sites.google.com/view/oren-kolodny-homepage
Nicole Creanza*
Affiliation:
Department of Biological Sciences, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA nicole.creanza@vanderbilt.edu; http://nicolecreanza.com Evolutionary Studies Initiative, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
*
*Corresponding authors.
*Corresponding authors.
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Abstract

Innovations, such as symbolic artifacts, are a product of cognitive abilities but also of cultural context. Factors that may determine the emergence and retention of an innovation include the population's pre-existing cultural repertoire, exposure to relevant ways of thinking, and the invention's utility. Thus, we suggest that the production of symbolic artifacts is not guaranteed even in cognitively advanced societies.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 48 , 2025 , e4
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press

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