title: Multilevel processes and cultural adaptation: Examples from past and present small-scale societies.
abstract: Cultural adaptation has become central in the context of accelerated global change with authors increasingly acknowledging the importance of understanding multilevel processes that operate as adaptation takes place. We explore the importance of multilevel processes in explaining cultural adaptation by describing how processes leading to cultural (mis)adaptation are linked through a complex nested hierarchy, where the lower levels combine into new units with new organizations, functions, and emergent properties or collective behaviours. After a brief review of the concept of "cultural adaptation" from the perspective of cultural evolutionary theory and resilience theory, the core of the paper is constructed around the exploration of multilevel processes occurring at the temporal, spatial, social and political scales. We do so by examining small-scale societies' case studies. In each section, we discuss the importance of the selected scale for understanding cultural adaptation and then present an example that illustrates how multilevel processes in the selected scale help explain observed patterns in the cultural adaptive process. We end the paper discussing the potential of modelling and computer simulation for studying multilevel processes in cultural adaptation.
authors: Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats; Institut of Environmental Science and Technology, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193, Cerdanyola del Valles, Barcelona, Spain.
authors: V
authors: V
authors: Reyes-García
authors: Complexity and Socio-Ecological Dynamics, Institució Mila i Fontanals, Spanish National Research Council, Barcelona, Spain.
authors: A L
authors: AL
authors: Balbo
authors: Department of International Environment and Development Studies (Noragric), Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Ås, Norway; Norwegian Institute for Nature Research, Oslo, Norway.
authors: E
authors: E
authors: Gomez-Baggethun
authors: Institut of Environmental Science and Technology, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193, Cerdanyola del Valles, Barcelona, Spain.
authors: M
authors: M
authors: Gueze
authors: University of Exeter, UK.
authors: A
authors: A
authors: Mesoudi
authors: University of California, Davis, USA.
authors: P
authors: P
authors: Richerson
authors: Barcelona Supercomputing Center, Barcelona, Spain.
authors: X
authors: X
authors: Rubio-Campillo
authors: Institut of Environmental Science and Technology, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193, Cerdanyola del Valles, Barcelona, Spain; Internet Interdisciplinary Institute, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Spain.
authors: I
authors: I
authors: Ruiz-Mallén
authors: Institute of Archaeology, University College London, UK.
authors: S
authors: S
authors: Shennan
keywords: cultural adaptation; cultural evolution; multilevel selection; resilience