The Evolution of Culture: Adaptive Socialization and Units of Inheritance

by j.w.gibson, copyright 2006

Introduction

The development of a highly complex set of social strategies has enabled humans to exert considerable control over their environments. Humans are inextricably social organisms, and as such must successfully develop species-normal functions across a variety of environmental and social domains (Scarr, 1993). Humans who do not develop species-normal behavior will be less successful at accessing social organizations and extra-genetic information, attracting potential mates, and/or gaining preferential access to resources. In order to become species-normal, human evolution has produced a singular, highly dynamic, mutable mechanism to provide the appropriate opportunities for species-normal development: culture. Culture is maintained by individuals’ ever changing personal ideas, beliefs, and behaviors. It does not exist on its own, but rather in the minds of each individual. Culture is a social adaptation that provides a generic framework for the processing of developmental information and experience necessary for species-normal development. The impact of culture on individual development cannot be underestimated. Cultural constructs influence every cognitive structure, the interpretation and appropriateness of behavioral actions, and the development of motivations. Because cultural ownership resides with individual members, a “culture” is in a perpetual state of flux, adapting through the actions of individuals.


In evolution, increasingly complex structures are always the result of natural selection. All life is a result of natural selection on the genetic design, or biology, of an organism. All extant behaviors of organisms must therefore be rooted in biology. Considering a mental module that contained the propensity for cultural participation would need to be exceedingly complex, the only likely explanation is that culture is a product of selective design. Imagine the different cognitive machines necessary to sort, categorize, input, recall, evaluate, and differentiate information! Klein, Cosmides, Tooby, and Chance (2002) identified factors in the evolution of memory, a necessary yet minute fraction, of culture. Current theories on memory suggest that there may be up to five different, isolable memory systems: procedural, perceptual-representational, primary, semantic, and episodic (Klein, Cosmides, Tooby, & Chance, 2002). Each of these memory systems entails, at least, dozens of sub-procedural mechanisms for acquiring, processing, evaluating, and making meaning from input. To describe the total complexity of the mechanisms behind human culture may prove nearly impossible. However, it is possible to develop theories of, what I term, super-organization. That is, what managerial or organizational structures are necessary in a mental module that has developed to support cultural knowledge transmission as an adaptive function?


The difficulty in convincing the “hard” evolutionary sciences that such a structure exists or could be materially identified rests on the fact that psychological structures, and especially adaptive cognitive architecture, are troublesome to describe and support empirically. While theory supports that individuals should demonstrate highly complex mechanisms, or specialized modules for dealing with a variety of domain specific problems (Tooby & Cosmides, 1990), proving those structures exist is another matter. However, several evolutionary studies have found evidence to support the existence of adaptive modules. Utilization of biological adaptive theory will be necessary if psychology fully wishes to explain the evolution of culture. This paper discusses the evolution of culture as an adaptive strategy which transmutes survival information and species-normal behaviors. It is suggested that if culture begins in the minds of individual members, then a genetic component is more than probable, and that certain cultural traits may be transmitted as “units of inheritance” (Griesemer, 2000).

Human Evolution: Cognitive Programs

The study of human evolution has finally come to understand that multidisciplinary theories are needed to explain the extent and magnitude of human adaptations. Evolutionary psychology attempts to identify and explain the development of cognitive structures. These programs adapted by natural selection in a particular environmental situation. Darwinian theorists unanimously agree “that [natural] selection is the explanatory law” (Fracchia & Lewontin, 1999).

Evolutionary biologists, geneticists, and physical anthropologists have dramatically strengthened the range of theoretical models of human evolution. Psychology and other social sciences, have suffered from data envy, leading to skepticism about the accuracy of psychological inferences. Given the recency of evolutionary theory across the social sciences, it will take some time before confidence in experimentation is acceptable to other divisions of evolutionary study. Theories in evolutionary psychology are treated cautiously due to “underexposed opportunities for falsification” (Conway & Schaller, 2002). Others have offered criticisms about the nature of cognitive programs. Citing methodological inadequacies, Fodor rejects the idea that the mind evolved due to massive modularity; instead arguing that a small genetic alteration could easily have produced the difference in cognitive capacity of hominids (Okasha, 2003). Considering the complexity, specificity, and interconnectedness of cognitive programs, the hypothesis that these programs are types of neurological software ready to respond to environmental and cultural input, offer an organism an array of appropriate behaviors, calculate their potential effectiveness and consequences and build memory experiences for future reference, in addition to abstract organization and evaluation, seem to be attributed to small genetic alteration.

While evolutionary biologists and physical anthropologists have collected immense physical data in support of the evolution of anatomical structures, psychologists have had a difficult time deciding how to collect their “invisible” data. The psychological structures of behavior are so mixed up in the dynamics of environmental, social, and cultural interactions that to define a concrete mechanism is nearly hopeless. What psychologists must do is search for measurable behavior components which can be subjected to positivist science.
It is hard to separate the human mind from other physical structures. The brain is clearly a result of natural selective processes. There can be no logical argument against the evolution of culture as a human adaptation. Scientists universally agree that human biological hardware is definitely a process of evolution Indeed, when evolutionary psychologists suggest that the myriad of cognitive structures that developed to solve adaptive problems in ancient environments are evident in modern populations, these claims are generally accepted; if still hard to fully support with experimentation.

Culture is a biological adaptation and must be explained in the biological sciences (Fracchia & Lewontin, 1999). One stated goal of evolutionary psychology is to answer the grand question: what is human nature? Tooby and Cosmides (1990) have described human nature as “a set of innate psychological mechanisms and developmental programs” (p.23). Investigation of how cultural knowledge is organized, created, and used is fundamental to the interpretation of all other human experiences.

At a fundamental level, all organisms are chunks of biology that interact in different capacities in their environments. They continuously process information from around them and devise behaviors that satisfy some end. It is completely reasonable to assume that if all organisms are chunks of biology and all biology is subject to evolutionary forces, then any behavior, which is rooted in biological actions, must be somehow represented genetically. The brain itself is an adaptation that directs the entire organism in a coordinated manner. Any evolved structure, cognitive or behavioral, is the result of genetic design, manufacture, and environmental influence.

Evolutionary psychology is advantageously placed to illustrate and explain the cognitive structures of culture as a pan-human phenomenon. Evolutionary theory can help to explain how culture functions as the super organizer of social experience by illustrating how such organization satisfies a number of adaptive problems. The application of evolutionary perspectives in psychology is especially powerful at the explanatory level (Tooby & Cosmides, 1990). Because genes are filtered through natural selection, they are constantly engaged by environmental influences (Tooby & Cosmides, 1990). The debate about the extent of the interaction between genes and environment is now over. Finally it seems psychologists are discovering ways to describe the nature of the relationship: culture.

Cultural Conceptions

The concept of culture has been tragically misdefined, as a static, causal agent, affecting humans, but not affected by them (Buss, 2001). Part of the problem stems from an earlier tendency of anthropology to favor descriptive methods over explanatory methods. Theoretical models utilizing descriptive rather than explanatory data naturally produce descriptive accounts, which are limited to cross-cultural comparisons. Comparisons of different cultural apparatus are only marginally useful because they draw dark lines between cultures while failing to identify universals. In addition, the sheer volumes of information cultures define make a clear and useful definition slippery. The existence of every human experience resides somewhere in culture! Every fleeting thought, darkest dream, most mundane actions are made meaningful by our utilization of cultural information.

How does one describe, explain, and differentiate all the cumulative behavior represented in the total collection of human culture? It consists of ever changing “content of what is to be valued and acquired; biology provides the motivation and intelligence for learning it. Cultures define what is desirable to be learned, what is to be believed, and how to behave.” (Scarr, 1993). Cultures also establish an available parameter of opportunities that provide both normal and abnormal species development (Scarr, 1993). Cultures form boundaries and expectations of human social behavior. Cultures are “go-betweens,” buffering humans from a geography where they are dependent on energy resources. Culture acts as the unifying human house from which all developmental information is passed, evolutionary objectives are translated, and through which humans build understanding about life.

Humans have developed and been developed by culture. Input from the socioenvironment interacts within a highly complex set of social, group, and interpersonal factors that are used to construct knowledge about species-appropriate behavior. In turn, the success or failure of behaviors to satisfy an adaptation issue are encoded as memories, useful for providing background information in future decision making situations (Klein et al., 2002). To the extent that memories are stored in the neurological tissues of the brain and governed by the activity of neural cells, it is very probable that some aspects of acquired environmental information can become encoded in DNA. If it were not possible for “learned” behavior to become encoded, then each individual would have to re-learn the entirety of species specific information. “Whether the evolution is variational or transformational there must be some mechanism by which a new generation of successors retains some vestige of the changes that occurred in a previous time” (Fracchia & Lewontin, 1999).

The utilization of evolutionary theory in pursuit of cultural mechanisms is mildly controversial, to say the least. The basis for an evolutionary perspective in psychology is justified by the fact that at least some aspects of human cognition are the result of Darwinian natural selection (Okasha, 2003). Culture may well prove to be the super-organizer of the cognitive and developmental programs, a highly evolved and specialized organizational adaptive response to manage constantly increasing amounts of social-species specific information. The challenge for researchers is to design experiments that effectively collect solid data on the nature of cognitive organization machines and identify the process by which environmental experience can change the genetic signature of heritable programs.

Niche Construction: How Culture Shapes the Environment

Human social groups develop specific strategies relevant to the social and environmental factors in a local area. The job of culture is to provide a general framework from which a range of strategies are available. For example, Cohen (1998) discussed the adaptive function of a culture of honor in the South and West of America. Cohen explains the high acceptance of violence and strong purveyance of individual honor as reactions to the “frontier” history and minimalism of law enforcement. In an environment where men were forced to protect their interests and solve conflict themselves, honor and the legitimization of violence increased one’s fitness (Cohen, 1998). Numerous localized (meaning indigent to a specific geography) cultural adaptations have been noted in anthropological studies. In summarizing the historical development of cultural understanding, Buss (2001) discusses the differential development of social aggression in neighboring villages of Yanomamo Indians of Venezuela. At least two groups show profoundly different personality traits. Lowland Yanomamo men are highly aggressive; they often hit their wives with sticks for minor infractions, often challenge other men to club or ax fights, and sometimes declare war on neighboring villages, killing the men and capturing their wives (Buss, 2001).

Highland Yanomamo villages are markedly different. Disliking fighting, they are more peaceful. These Yanomamo do not raid neighboring villages or engage in ax fights, rarely in club fights. Instead the virtues of cooperation are stressed (Buss, 2001). Food sources are more plentiful in the lowlands; aggression is advantageous for controlling as much food and reproduction resources as possible, and indeed, the most aggressive Yanomamo have the most wives (Buss, 2001). Highland food resources are much more limited. These Yanomamo have learned to pool their collective resources increasing the survival of the group over the individual. Cultural influences favored cooperative behavior where thin resources can be stretched more equally (Buss, 2001). The particular manifestation of culture depends, in part, upon resident ecological variables.

By altering human behavior, culture can impact the local ecology of an area. Laland, Odling-Smee, and Feldman (2001) suggest that there is ample evidence to argue that “cultural activities have influenced human genetic evolution by modifying sources of natural selection and altering genotype frequencies in some human populations” (Laland, Odling-Smee, & Feldman, 2001). Niche construction is the study of how organisms change their environments to better solve survival problems. Humans build homes, cities, shopping centers, hospitals, parks, schools; they change nature and live in an artificial environment advantageous to the species survival. The impact of organisms on the environment is not small. For instance, cyanobacteria are responsible for the creation of oxygen in Earth’s atmosphere; over millions of years of photosynthesis (Laland et al., 2001). In addition, the invention of nuclear weapons, digital information processing, and industrialization have begun environmental changes that are yet unquantifiable. Few species have changed the selective environment as drastically as human beings (Laland et al., 2001).

Cultural behaviors do affect the environments that humans live in. Evolutionary biologists stress that culture frequently affects evolution by modifying the selection pressures and biasing available resource situations (Laland et al., 2001). Agriculture and industry affect natural selection pressures on population size and structure (Laland et al., 2001). Gene-culture coevolution theories have been developed using mathematical and conceptual models to describe how genetic evolution influences culture and how culture drives genetic changes (Laland et al., 2001). Laland et al. (2001) make several important conclusions about heritable units. First, there is no simple function that relates frequency of cultural niche-constructing activity to the frequency of the population’s genes. Cultural activity is too broad to be explained by simple relationships. For example, the Kwa-speaking yam farmers of West Africa have a significantly high frequency of the sickle-cell allele (Laland et al., 2001). Traditionally, these people clear cut the rainforest to make room for fields, simultaneously creating new standing water resources which amplify the reproduction of malaria-carrying mosquitoes. Mosquito population is also dependent on environmental factors, such as rainfall, and rainfall is dependent on meteorological processes and so on. The selective pressure to increase the sickle-cell allele cannot be simply explained by a dual relationship between cultural activity and environment, there are too many variables in the system (Laland et al., 2001). Evidence of cultural processes can be seen in genetic variability when cultural activities work to change selective pressures.

“Cultural evolution does not exist as a distinct category from biological evolution” (Griesemer, 2000). Identification of the “units of heritance” of cultural transmission rely on a specific definition of a reproducer, which is a combination of genetic instructions and developmental opportunities (Griesemer, 2000). Genes do not, by themselves, develop into useful structures. Culture transmits developmental opportunities to individuals who in turn provide relevant genetic material with the interaction necessary to successfully develop into a phenotype. Units of heritable structures concerning culture are likely to be those which require environmental and social data to mature into their intended structure or purpose.

Conclusion

Finding conclusive cognitive structures, for which the biological sciences support, is a worthy yet problematic area of study for evolutionary psychologists. Until neurological functioning can be “grouped” into specific domains, physically and empirically delineated, and linked to cultural organization strategies, evolutionary psychologists will struggle with an acceptable explanation for the relationship between culture, genes, and evolution. The study of memory systems, information processing, personality, and social interactions are all benefited by the successful development of a theory that explains how cultural influences contribute to genetic variability. When looking for cultural units which may be coded in genetics, psychologists should focus on those structures whose genes require developmental experiences or other species-conveyed information. Future developments in biology will be crucial in providing psychologists with empirical connections between environmental pressures and genetic encoding processes. If the ultimate goal of the human sciences is to explain “human nature” then a synthesis of the life and social sciences is absolutely necessary.

The return of Darwinistic theory across the sciences has clearly established the cooperative ability and utility of cross-discipline perspectives in explaining complex evolutionary processes. If culture functions as a super-organizer of environmental experience and extra-genetic species knowledge, then its explanation is of considerable importance and should receive due attention by researchers.

References

Buss, D. M. (2001). Human nature and culture: an evolutionary psychological perspective. Journal of Personality, 69(6), 955-978.
Cohen, D. (1998). Culture, social organization, and patterns of violence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 75(2), 408-419.
Conway, L. G. I., & Schaller, M. (2002). On the verifiability of evolutionary psychological theories: An analysis of the psychology of scientific persuasion. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 6(2), 152-166.
Fracchia, J., & Lewontin, R. C. (1999). Does culture evolve? History & Theory, 38(4).
Griesemer, J. (2000). Development, culture and the units of inheritance. Philosophy of Science, 67(Proceedings), S348-S368.
Klein, S. B., Cosmides, L., Tooby, J., & Chance, S. (2002). Decisions and the evolution of memory: Multiple systems, multiple functions. Psychological Review, 109(2), 306-329.
Laland, K. N., Odling-Smee, J., & Feldman, M. W. (2001). Cultural niche construction and human evolution. Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 14, 22-33.
Okasha, S. (2003). Fodor on cognition, modularity and adaptionism. Philosophy of Science, 70, 68-88.
Scarr, S. (1993). Biological and cultural diversity: The legacy of Darwin for development. Child Development, 64, 1333-1353.
Tooby, J., & Cosmides, L. (1990). On the universality of human nature and the uniqueness of the individual: The role of genetics and adaptation. Journal of Personality, 58(1), 17-67.

Evolutionary Theory and Adolescent Rites of Passage As Adaptive Socializing Mechanisms

By j.w. gibson copyright 2007

Introduction

The culmination of adolescence is the successful transition from childhood to adulthood, emotionally, biologically, and socially.   In numerous societies, specific ceremonies and rituals known as adolescent rites of passage mark this transition.  These rituals serve to remove the adolescent from their normal sphere in society, ingrain important cultural knowledge about adult roles and expectations, and then welcome them back with new status, identity, and responsibilities.  The main utility of these rites is to prepare the adolescent for social maturity (Weisfeld, 1997).

            Van Gennep (1960) analyzed many ethnographies of ritual in different societies, finally describing an underlying structure in the phenomena of rites of passage.  This similarity in underlying structure echoes Joseph Campbell’s  description of mythological structure (Flowers, 1991), and Carl Jung’s  collective unconscious (Jung, 1968a, 1968b), both of which make very convincing arguments for a biological template of meaning making from ritual.  It will be argued that rites of passage in puberty and adolescence are the cultural equivalent of the biological changes that humans undergo, including sexual maturation, and the start of menarche.  Weisfeld (1997) supports this view when he states,

“Preparation of the adolescent for maturity presumably involves a number of tasks.  She or he must be prepared not only for establishing and heading a family but also for participation in the adult community at large.  Perhaps some of the universal tasks in attaining adulthood—mastering adult subsistence roles, finding and keeping a mate, caring for children, developing an allegiance to the community, and so forth—are facilitated by puberty rites” (p. 28).

Traditional cultures are widely known to utilize rites of passage for transitioning girls and boys into adulthood.  According to Weisfeld (1997), when Schlegel and Barry (1980a) limited their definition to initiation ceremony alone, they found rites in one or both sexes in 52% of the original 182 worldwide traditional cultures studied by Murdock and White (1969).  This overwhelming percentage cannot be dismissed as species insignificant, and lends strong corroboration for significant adaptive value in the development of rites of passage across the human species.

Adolescent rites of passage in industrialized countries has become increasingly inconsequential, possibly due to the overwhelming emphasis on individuality over communal cooperation in mainstream social life, exposure to many different belief systems, or the lack of a formalized ritual “overseer”.  This slow decline of formalized rites of passage into adulthood has not diminished altogether, however, and increasingly, adolescents and young adults are left with semblances of rites of passage, including high school or college graduation, and obtaining a driver’s license, or blessings (Bjornsen, 2000; Fasick, 1988).  In absence of any formalized ritual, many other adolescents may attempt to create their own ceremonies to announce their arrival in the adult social arena.  These include bouts of intoxication, body modification, and gang initiation, to name a few (Sande, 2002; Vigil, 1996; Wall, n.d.). 

The goal of this paper is threefold.  First, to describe the phenomena and structure of rites of passage as they apply to adolescence.  Secondly, to discuss how adolescent rites of passage may be part of a biologically based schema designed to make meaning from symbolic experience; and that this meaning-making schema is a cultural-evolutionary adaptation that helped early humans to survive in their environments by utilizing culture and the social nature of humans to accelerate sexually mature individuals into mainstream reproductive culture.  Finally, to analyze the effects of the absence of formal adolescent rites of passage in industrialized countries on the development of adolescents into successful members of the adult community.

Operational Definitions

Before discussing the structure of rites of passage in general and specifically adolescent rites of passage, several definitions are required for clarification.  Adolescence hereafter refers to the transitional period marked by the onset of puberty and ends with the individual being behaviorally and emotionally self-regulating, financially independent of the family, and the taking on of culturally accepted adult roles (Jaffe, 1998).  While researchers generally agree that adolescence begins with puberty, marking its end is more difficult, made especially so in industrialized societies that often foster the prolongation of adolescent behaviors, such as education, for adult roles. 

Under this definition of adolescence it may seem that some individuals will not completely pass through adolescence into adulthood.  For instance, many adults are unable to control their emotions in socially acceptable ways and display anger or violence in unacceptable situations.  Also, becoming financially independent may not be a reliable marker for all individuals in American society, the richest nation in the world, whose elite parents’ fortune often continues to support their children in perpetuity.  In addition, “culturally accepted adult roles” implies that there is a shared acceptance of adult roles, which may not accurately reflect the real society.  For instance, homosexual marriages are generally looked down upon in most states, let alone the roles that each member brings to the marriage, but this does not mean that homosexual marriage roles need to follow the national expectation of normal, or that those who are in such marriages are species abnormal.  For the purposes of this paper, the definition of adolescence will refer to the species normal development of an individual in the larger culture, but not as a function of cultural belief survey statistics.  In addition, because the onset of puberty is a reliable marker for the beginning of adolescence, the term puberty rites and adolescent rites of passage are synonymous in this work. 

Furthermore, successful transition from adolescence to adulthood has been characterized by a psychological separation and individuation during early and late adolescence (Hoffman, 1984).  Several studies (Fulmer, Medalie, & Lord, 1982 in Hoffman, 1984) have discussed the emphasis psychoanalytic and attachment theories place on the role of separation in successful species normal development.  Adolescents who are not able to psychologically separate from their parents and form individual identity may well fail to learn and participate in adult roles in society. 

Psychological Separation

The development of emotional independency begins in the first few years of life, when the infant engages in the first social relationship of the species, that of the caregiver.  During the first years, an intense emotional relationship is built between the child and primary care giver(s), usually the mother.  The infant goes through a series of developmental stages beginning with breaking away from the mother-infant dyad, leading to reconciliation, ending with an internalization of the mother image (Hoffman, 1984).  The infant will gradually learn to become more emotionally independent as it learns to act more independently.  The transition to emotional independency will be smooth and gradual if the relationship of the mother-infant is loving, positive, and consistent and emphasizes encouragement (Hoffman, 1984).  However, when the mother-infant relationship is not healthy; characterized by anxiety, hostility, rejection, or ambivalence, the psychological separation cannot be smooth and gradual because the internalization of the mother image is malformed or incomplete (Hoffman, 1984).  In other words, when children’s needs are not met in the early years of life, they tend to be left with unresolved desires or attitudes about how the world will treat them.  Consequently, when they are required to demonstrate adult behaviors, they are emotionally inadequate. 

Hoffman (1984) believes that this separation-individuation phase of the first three years of life consists of several aspects, including behavioral independence or functional independence, representational-cognitive differentiation or attitudinal independence, and emotional independence, that can later be manifested in conflictual emotions, conflictual independence, in adolescence and adulthood.  These four factors are useful for understanding the separation of adolescents from their parents and the self-creation of socially acceptable adult identities.  Thus, successful transition to adulthood requires the adolescent to be functionally, emotionally, conflictually, and attitudinally mature.  As will be discussed later, these developmental needs of adolescents may be enriched, emphasized, and reinforced by cultural processes that have developed in evolutionary history.  Traditionally, rites of passage rituals may have helped to ensure the proper development of adolescents in these domains before acceptance into the larger adult culture. 

Adolescent Rites of Passage: Structure and Function

Rites of passage, in one form or another, are universal among adolescents (Delaney, 1995).  Arnold Van Gennep (1909/1960) originally coined the term rites of passage to refer to a cross-cultural phenomenon of rituals of transition including those that mark the passage of individual members of a society through the life course—birth, initiation, engagement, marriage, healing and death (Hockey, 2002).  Van Gennep analyzed numerous ethnographies and discovered an underlying form or schema.  Hockey (2002) discusses how Van Gennep identified the ways in which individuals move between social locations which are often delineated by age, i.e. boyhood/manhood, single/married.  When the cultural details were sifted out what was left was a tripartite structure that describes (1) separation from normal society, (2) an ambiguous time betwixt and between  fixed positions, and (3) re-introduction into the society with a new social position (Hockey, 2002). 

            The divisions of rites of passage in general can be further explained in the context of adolescent rites of passage.  Delaney (1995) further divided the tripartite model into four sections; separation, preparation and instruction by an elder/mentor, transition (child-adult) accompanied by a ceremony, and a welcoming back into society with a changed status.  The only real difference between Delaney (1995) and Van Gennep (1909/1960) is that Delaney splits the betwixt and between time into two parts, i.e. preparation and transition.  The following examples will help to elucidate how different cultural puberty rites support the tripartite model.

            The Okiek are an indigenous people of Kenya.  Both girls and boys take part in similar rites of passage ceremonies where they are initially separated both from each other and the rest of the society.  Then they are ceremoniously circumcised to signify their sexual maturity, live apart from adults and the opposite sex for four to 24 weeks, paint themselves in order to appear as wild animals and gain sacred knowledge, and are then welcomed back to the community as adult members (Delaney, 1995).

            A common adolescent rite of passage in the Amerindians was that of the vision quest.  Usually males, 14-15 years old, were removed from the group, taken to a sweat lodge where their bodies were purified, advised and assisted by a medicine man, after which the boys were taken to an isolated spot to fast for 4-5 days and await a vision directing them to their path in life as a man.  After the vision, the new members of society are welcomed back and expected to take on adult responsibilities including marriage and children (Delaney, 1995).

            Festa das Mocas Novas is the initiation rite for women of the Tukuna people of the Northwest Amazon.  At the onset of menstruation, the women are isolated, for 4-12 weeks, in a small chamber in their family’s homes.  The girls are believed to be dwelling in the underworld in constant danger from Demons.  After seclusion, a ritual ensues where relatives wear masks, incarnating the demons of the underworld and a shaman gives the girl a fire brand (sacred knowledge) to destroy the power of the demons.  After this the girl is welcomed to womanhood (Delaney, 1995).

            It is not necessary for each culture’s rite of passage to consist of all three parts (separation, instruction, return).  Weisfeld (1997) noted that all three were only found in 17 of the 37 societies studied by Precourt (1975).  The fact that puberty rites are so wide spread in human societies belies a societal advantage for the successful transition of adolescents into participating adults in a given society.  Perhaps closer analysis of the function of each phase can help to explain how the domains discussed by Hoffman (1984) are affected by formal rites of passage.

            As has already been discussed, separation from parents is critical to the development of an adolescent’s independence.  The first phase, separation, has two components, physical and psychological.  Physical separation serves as a concrete marker of transition.  It has been theorized that caves were sometimes used for pubertal rites in prehistory (Weisfeld, 1997).  Adolescents are removed from their parents’ presence, and opposite sex peers, where they cannot maintain their identities as dependent.  The physical separation emphasizes the need for adolescents to abandon their childish ways.  In modern society, summer camp and boarding school can be seen as institutions aimed at weaning children from their parents (Weisfeld, 1997). 

In addition to being separated from parents, boys and girls are secluded from each other.  The purpose of the second phase is for instruction of sex roles and information.  Adolescents, therefore, must be guided by same sex mentors, which serve to teach a woman how to be a woman, and a man to be a man.  It has also been suggested that sex segregation of puberty rites parallels the increasing sex differentiation resulting from puberty (Weisfeld, 1997).  This has been witnessed around the world in both girls and boys who show a drastic preference for same sex peers around 9 or 10 years old (Weisfeld, 1997).  This may be due to a natural tendency to compile sexual knowledge into a group where it can be easily shared with all members.

Psychological separation announces to the individual that a new behavior is required.  For those adolescents who have not had successful experiences during attachment and are therefore still emotionally dependent, this marker is exemplified by the physical separation from the attachment figure (Gibson, 2003b).  Psychologically, the individual must develop, if they have previously not, the appropriate psychological mechanisms to navigate the learning and responsibilities expected of their new status. 

The second phase has been referred to as transition (Weisfeld, 1997), betwixt and between fixed positions (Hockey, 2002; Van Gennep, 1960), the liminal phase (Sande, 2002), and preparation/instruction (Delaney, 1995).  The common theme is a phase of learning and transformation.  As Delaney (1995) notes,

 “the transition itself most often takes place within the format of some ceremony…including (1) literal and spiritual cleansing, (2) physical transformation, (3) offerings, prayers, and blessings, (4) traditional food and dress, and (5) traditional musical instruments and song” (p.891).

Before the ceremony of transition takes place though, the adolescent is instructed on mythology, social issues, cultural values and practices, personal conduct, courtship practices, and duties to one’s spouse and society (Weisfeld, 1997).  This reeducation serves to emphasize the important knowledge and responsibilities gained with adult status.  It also reinforces the appropriate attitudes and behaviors expected in the society.

            Cognitively, adolescents are developmentally ready to receive this mass of cultural knowledge rapidly and uncritically.  Incidental learning peaks about 11-years old (Weisfeld, 1997) and two bilateral growth spurts in the cerebral cortex appear about 12 and 16-years old (Jaffe, 1998).  This growth in cognitive abilities coincides with sexual role and cultural learning provided by adolescent rites of passage.  Most adolescents are in Piaget’s Formal operational stage.  Adolescents in this stage are capable of thinking logically about abstract events and can reason about the world symbolically (Jaffe, 1998).  For the first time they can reason like adults and rites of passage are full of symbolic experience and information that can only be passed on when the adolescent has “come of age”. 

            After the initiates have undergone their separation, been instructed by a mentor on their new roles as adults, they are welcomed back into their communities with new status.  The purpose of the incorporation is to announce to other members of the adult group that the new members have achieved adult maturity sexually and socially.  Incorporation is often marked by a formalized ceremony.  Schlegel and Barry’s (1980a, as cited in Weisfeld, 1997) study found that 36% of all cultures celebrated boys transition with a formal ceremony, and 46% for girls.  When a formal ceremony does not take place, instruction is still terminated when a certain measurable level of maturity has occurred (Weisfeld, 1997). 

            During the incorporation a test may be given to the adolescent in order to prove they have reached adult status.  These ordeals (Weisfeld, 1997), are generally tests of some adult skill.  In some cultures, boys may be required to kill an animal, endure pain, or endure cold, hunger, and fear.  Ordeals may also serve to subdue disobedient youths; youths who may only belong to the elite membership of adulthood by showing respect to the ways of their elders. 

            Rites of passage are constructed rituals whose purpose is to expedite the successful transition of adolescents into adults within a given cultural framework and environment.  The universality of puberty rites across the human spectrum suggests that they may be the result of cultural evolution analogous to the biological changes that occur during puberty.  Weisfeld (1997) summed it up best when he wrote:

“puberty rites practices may interact adaptively with our ancestral primate behavioral and anatomical changes of puberty.  They may form an adaptive complex that can be understood by considering all three domains.  If a particular pubertal change in body or behavior evolved to accomplish some function, then it is likely that some cultural practice, such as an aspect of puberty rites, also developed to abet this function” (p.29).

For the human species, biological changes are mediated through culture practice.  If biology and cultural practices were not synergistic, then they would place their owners at a serious disadvantage for survival (Weisfeld, 1997). 

Cultural practices can check and improve on the development of its members by providing subsequent learning opportunities for functional, attitudinal, emotional, and conflictual independence.  Transition to adulthood is so important, as it relates to reproduction of species, that humans have universally developed a structure of ritual that ensures that those adults in society will have the greatest reproductive success because they have been indoctrinated into the cultural-sexual knowledge of the local group. 

Rites of Passage as Cultural Evolutionary Adaptations

Before discussion of adolescent rites of passage as evolutionary solutions to adaptive problems, it is necessary to briefly comment on culture as both a biological and behavioral adaptation in the Darwinian sense.  In evolution, increasingly complex structures can only be the result of natural selection (Darwin, 1859/1998).  Arguably, culture is the most complex of social structures endemic to human nature, and its adaptive nature can only be a result of evolutionary forces.  Behavior, as an outward manifestation of biology, is not subject to natural selection.  However, it does directly influence what type of genetic material is selected by changing the dynamics between the environment and the organism.  In other words, “genetically based variations in physical or psychological features of an individual interact with the environment, and, over many generations, these features tend to change in frequency, resulting, eventually, in species-wide traits in the population as a whole” (Bjorklund & Pellegrini, 2000).  Adaptations that are useful from a reproductive balcony tend to increase, while those that are negative tend to become obsolete because the carriers of such genotypes are less successful breeders. 

            In the field of evolutionary psychology, culture is both a guide of human behavior and collection of developmental information for species normal development (Scarr, 1993).  As such, it is widely accepted to be a significant evolutionary adaptation ( see Barash, 2001; Barkow, Cosmides, & Tooby, 1992; Buss, 2001; Fracchia & Lewontin, 1999; Laland, Odling-Smee, & Feldman, 2001; Okasha, 2003; Scarr, 1993).  Human culture and extant social behavior is highly variable because it is produced by an incredibly intricate, dependent set of functional programs that utilize and process data from the world, including intentional and unintentional information provided by other humans (Barkow et al., 1992).

            According to developmental systems theory (DST), the development of individuals is controlled by a bidirectional relationship between all level of biology and experiential factors (Bjorklund & Pellegrini, 2000).  This means that genetic activity (i.e. genes that code for protein molecules) determine the growth of structures (i.e. muscles or nerves), which in turn influences the activity and function of behavior in a specific environment.  Human behavior creates the environment in which humans live and thus alternately affects activity, necessary structures and on down the line.  Therefore, cultural activity can affect the biology of an individual by creating an environment that selects for certain traits over others. 

            Culture is the super-organizer of mental modules (Gibson, 2003a).  It has developed to support cultural knowledge transmission and facilitate the processing of cognitive needs in human social interactions.  As complex as culture is, there are certain patterns and themes that programs tend to adhere to for efficiency and flexibility.  For example, all human stories, regardless or culture, language, or time, have the same basic structure once stripped of their cultural costume (Campbell, 1949/1973).  The tripartite nature of mythology mimics that of ritual.  First there is the departure, the hero(ine) must leave their normal world regardless of their personal desires and travel across a threshold into another realm.  After the character has left their known world, they step into the initiation phase where they are instructed, tested, and tempted.  After they have successfully overcome their ordeals they return to their old world, bringing some micro or macroscopic change into society (Campbell, 1949/1973).  Often times this change is little other than personal growth, but it serves to protect the society and ensure the cycle of life.  Campbell (1949/1973) called this underlying mythological structure the monomyth, and it’s similarity to ritual structure is no coincidence.  Undergoing personal ritual is symbolic in acting out one’s personal mythology.  Those who are tempted and tested, who prove their status and usefulness to society are welcomed back to help perpetuate the life cycle.  Those who do not are not. 

            Humans take environmental experiences and utilize their psychology to imbue them with significance, they share these constructions with each other and understand them because they have evolved with the same cognitive architecture in similar ancestral environments, namely that of hunter and gatherers.  The development of ritual institutions, specifically that of adolescent rites of passage, advantages the reproductive success of the species by turning out adults who are capable of carrying on the necessary roles of sexually mature members.  By subjecting adolescents to a departure, initiation, and return phase in a ritual, humans are using their cognitive architecture to improve upon the maturing process and in effect wean costly (measured in allocated resources) adolescents into providing members of the social group.

Conclusions: Rituals in Modern Society

The fact that myths and rituals exist in all human cultures and the underlying structure is the same makes it extremely likely that a mental module exists in the human brain that governs certain types of symbolic meaning making from experience.  For nearly 2 million years, the ancestors of modern humans have been challenged with survival in different regions of the world.  The use of speech and tools is clearly evident as early as homo erectus circa 1.8 million to 300,000 years ago (Trigger, 1989), so it is entirely likely that cultural mechanisms were also in effect at this time.  Because natural selection works on the reproductive fitness of individuals, it is logical that the social cooperation of human tribes would tend to evolve mechanisms prudent for improved sexual reproduction.  Adolescence is clearly marked by biological changes, puberty.  Adolescent rites of passage probably developed out of the need to (1) identify those entering sexual maturity—separation, (2) instruct newly developed adolescents in the ways of sexual reproductive customs and child rearing practices—initiation, and (3) announce their arrival of sexual readiness into the larger group—return.  If this tripartite structure was not effective in increasing reproductive success and adult behaviors in a society, it would have been replaced by a more profitable mental module via natural selection.

            The absence of formalized rites of passage for adolescents in many industrialized countries is of great concern.  Adolescents desire to be recognized as adults, autonomous members of society, and obtain the rights and privileges due them.  Lacking any formalized ritual to help them transition, many adolescents struggle to “create their own rituals which at best are partially successful, but often disastrous” (Delaney, 1995).  For example, Chicano barrio street gangs in urban California have created their own initiation rites which often involve brutal beatings, stabbing, and crime (Vigil, 1996).  In addition, street gangs recruit the majority of their members during the middle school years, when youngsters are naturally susceptible to the influence of older role models, and same sex peers.

            One explanation for the disappearance of formalized adolescent rites of passage may be because contemporary American society is based primarily on monetary and vocational gains, and traditional rites of passage no longer play a substantial role in the determination of social status (Wall, n.d.).  High school graduation, obtaining a driver’s license, or turning 18 all mark some pseudo-transition period and do impart some measure of adult responsibility, but they do not collectively determine the arrival of maturity or readiness for adult social responsibilities, and specifically, they neglect the sexual reproductive aspects of adult life. 

            Adolescent rites of passage developed in evolutionary history because it was advantageous for there to be more sexually mature individuals in a group.  Whether rites of passage to mark adulthood will continue to be a necessary component of human culture depends upon their contemporary effectiveness to increase reproductive or psychological fitness. 

               

           

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