SubsidieMeestersChildren as Agents of Cultural Evolution
ChACE investigates child and adolescent peer cultures to uncover unique cultural evolutionary mechanisms and their role in community adaptation to change.
Projectdetails
Introduction
Cultural evolutionary theory is quickly gaining traction as a unifying framework for the social sciences. However, research into culture acquisition paints a picture of children as vessels for inheriting evolved culture from adults, rather than cultural producers in their own right.
Project Aim
ChACE aims to overturn this long-established orthodoxy by taking child and adolescent peer cultures as a focal point. Neglected by cultural evolutionary theorists, peer cultures are incredibly well conserved across generations despite threats to social transmission that are nonexistent in adult cultures. This challenges our understanding of how cultures are maintained and changed across generations.
Research Focus
By intensively studying children’s peer cultures, ChACE stands to discover novel causal mechanisms for cultural evolution. ChACE specifically advances two ground-breaking hypotheses built upon firm theoretical and empirical foundations in folklore, cultural evolution, human life history, and cognitive development:
- Peer cultures evidence distinct cultural evolutionary mechanisms from adult cultures.
- Knowledge produced as part of peer cultures helps communities adapt to social and ecological change.
Methodology
ChACE will develop a robust and transferable methodology to jumpstart the study of peer cultures. Reflecting best-practice workflows for causal analysis, ChACE will first build ethnographically informed agent-based models to derive testable and falsifiable predictions.
Empirical Evaluation
These predictions will be empirically evaluated via:
- Experiments
- Observations
- Surveys
- Interviews with children and adolescents aged 4-16 years, and their caregivers
This research will take place at four globally representative field sites undergoing rapid culture change:
- The Likouala (Republic of the Congo)
- The Omo Valley (Ethiopia)
- Toledo (Belize)
- County Durham (U.K.)
Conclusion
In doing so, ChACE will initiate a disciplinary course correction by driving forward an explicit and holistic account of children’s adaptive contributions to culture change.
Financiële details & Tijdlijn
Financiële details
| Subsidiebedrag | € 1.499.640 |
| Totale projectbegroting | € 1.499.640 |
Tijdlijn
| Startdatum | 1-6-2025 |
| Einddatum | 31-5-2030 |
| Subsidiejaar | 2025 |
Partners & Locaties
Projectpartners
- UNIVERSITY OF DURHAMpenvoerder
Land(en)
Vergelijkbare projecten binnen European Research Council
| Project | Regeling | Bedrag | Jaar | Actie |
|---|---|---|---|---|
The evolutionary origins of human culture: a primatological perspectiveCULT_ORIGINS aims to investigate the evolutionary origins of culture in primates using deep learning and naturalistic experiments to uncover cultural variation and cooperative behaviors, challenging human uniqueness. | ERC Starting... | € 1.500.000 | 2022 | Details |
Leveraging Early Adolescence for Development: Longitudinal and Experimental Evidence from GhanaThis project aims to evaluate a parenting skills program's impact on early adolescent development in Ghana, leveraging a longitudinal study to assess social-emotional, academic, and health outcomes. | ERC Starting... | € 1.638.020 | 2023 | Details |
Changing Environments, Changing Childhoods: A Cross-Environmental Ethnography of Moral Socialization in Three Small-Scale SocietiesThis project examines how environmental changes affect children's moral development in three Indigenous societies through ethnographic studies and comparative analysis of their interactions. | ERC Starting... | € 1.500.000 | 2025 | Details |
The Interplay of Children’s and Parents’ Networks in Shaping Each Other’s Social WorldsThis project investigates how children's and parents' social networks co-evolve in diverse educational settings to understand and reduce intergenerational social boundaries and segregation. | ERC Starting... | € 1.496.538 | 2024 | Details |
Re-thinking Psychological Acculturation: From Explicit to Implicit Cultural AffiliationsPsychAcc investigates the implicit processes of psychological acculturation among ethnic minority and majority youth in Belgium to enhance understanding and predict well-being and educational outcomes. | ERC Starting... | € 1.700.000 | 2024 | Details |
The evolutionary origins of human culture: a primatological perspective
CULT_ORIGINS aims to investigate the evolutionary origins of culture in primates using deep learning and naturalistic experiments to uncover cultural variation and cooperative behaviors, challenging human uniqueness.
Leveraging Early Adolescence for Development: Longitudinal and Experimental Evidence from Ghana
This project aims to evaluate a parenting skills program's impact on early adolescent development in Ghana, leveraging a longitudinal study to assess social-emotional, academic, and health outcomes.
Changing Environments, Changing Childhoods: A Cross-Environmental Ethnography of Moral Socialization in Three Small-Scale Societies
This project examines how environmental changes affect children's moral development in three Indigenous societies through ethnographic studies and comparative analysis of their interactions.
The Interplay of Children’s and Parents’ Networks in Shaping Each Other’s Social Worlds
This project investigates how children's and parents' social networks co-evolve in diverse educational settings to understand and reduce intergenerational social boundaries and segregation.
Re-thinking Psychological Acculturation: From Explicit to Implicit Cultural Affiliations
PsychAcc investigates the implicit processes of psychological acculturation among ethnic minority and majority youth in Belgium to enhance understanding and predict well-being and educational outcomes.