title: Studying the emergence of complicated group-level cultural traits requires a mathematical framework.
abstract: Understanding the cultural evolution of complicated group-level traits requires the mathematical formulation of a dynamical system with birth and death events at multiple levels, that is, at the level of individual humans and at the level of groups of humans. Both levels are characterized by cultural traits that have complicated transmission, innovation, and inheritance mechanisms and that can undergo a form of Lamarckian evolution.
authors: Department of Zoology and Department of Mathematics,University of British Columbia,Vancouver,BC V6T 1Z4,Canada.doebeli@zoology.ubc.cawww.ubc.ca.
authors: Michael
authors: M
authors: Doebeli
authors: Department of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences,University of Colorado at Denver,Denver,CO 80202.Burt.Simon@ucdenver.eduhttp://www.ucdenver.edu.
authors: Burton
authors: B
authors: Simon
mesh_terms: D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D003468:Cultural Evolution; D006126:Group Processes; D006801:Humans; D012641:Selection, Genetic