Laland Obrien 2010
Laland Obrien 2010
net/publication/226209521
CITATIONS READS
143 685
2 authors:
Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:
All content following this page was uploaded by Michael J. O’Brien on 04 June 2014.
K. N. Laland
School of Biology, University of St Andrews, St Andrews, Scotland, UK
e-mail: knl1@st-andrews.ac.uk
M. J. O’Brien (*)
Department of Anthropology, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO, USA
e-mail: obrienm@missouri.edu
Laland and O’Brien
as an initiator of evolutionary change rather than merely the end product of earlier
selection. Although this position remains controversial (Laland et al. 2005; Laland
and Sterelny 2006), there is now extensive evidence that niche construction is
evolutionarily consequential.
In recent years, NCT has gathered momentum, largely through the development
of formal population genetics theory, which has demonstrated that niche construction
strongly affects evolutionary outcomes (Odling-Smee 1988; Laland et al. 1996,
1999; Odling-Smee et al. 1996, 2003; Lewontin 2000; Oyama et al. 2001; Sterelny
2003, 2007; Boni and Feldman 2005; Donohue 2005; Lehmann 2008). Some
organism-driven changes in environments persist as a legacy to modify selection on
subsequent generations, which Odling-Smee (1988) called an “ecological inheri-
tance.” Population-genetic models reveal that this ecological inheritance generates
unusual evolutionary dynamics (Laland et al. 1996, 1999, 2000, 2001; Silver and Di
Paolo 2006). Populations evolving in response to features of the environment
modified by their ancestors exhibit momentum effects (continuing to evolve in the
same direction after selection has stopped or reversed—a lag effect), inertia effects
(no noticeable evolutionary response to selection for a number of generations—
another kind of lag effect), and opposite and sudden catastrophic responses to
selection. Niche-constructing traits can drive themselves to fixation by generating
disequilibrium between niche-constructing alleles and alleles whose fitness depends
on resources modified by niche construction (Silver and Di Paolo 2006). Costly
niche-constructing traits can be favored because of the benefits of the niche
construction that will accrue to distant descendants (Lehmann 2008); this is because
evolutionary fitness ultimately depends not on number of offspring, or even grand-
offspring, but on the long-term genetic legacy of alleles or genotypes.
Odling-Smee et al. (2003) authored the first book on the topic—Niche
Construction: The Neglected Process in Evolution—which summarized the
empirical and theoretical findings and presented methods for investigating niche
construction. Numerous empirical studies followed (e.g., Donohue 2005; Flack et al.
2006), and interest in the topic has blossomed into a multidisciplinary movement,
involving evolutionary biologists, ecologists, psychologists, anthropologists, archae-
ologists, computer scientists, philosophers, and others.
NCT stresses that, in modifying their own world, organisms frequently modify the
environments of other organisms that share those environments. The role of
cyanobacteria in the creation of Earth's oxygen-rich atmosphere, the soil-perturbing
activities of earthworms, and the dam building of beavers exemplify the huge range of
temporal and spatial scales across which niche construction occurs. Such examples
bring out the dependencies of co-evolution on nontrophic as well as trophic
interactions. When beavers build dams, they affect considerably more than the
probability that genes for dam building will spread. They also modify nutrient cycling
and decomposition dynamics, modify the structure and dynamics of the riparian zone,
influence the character of water and materials transported downstream, and ultimately
influence plant and community composition and diversity (Naiman et al. 1988). In
doing so, they indirectly modify the pattern and strength of selection acting on a host
of beaver traits and similarly modify selection acting on thousands of other species
(Odling-Smee et al. 2003). Niche construction is both an important source of co-
evolutionary interactions and a major form of connectivity between biota.
Laland and O’Brien
Perturbation Relocation
Niche construction may be inceptive or counteractive and may occur through perturbation of the
environment or through relocation in space. Reproduced from Odling-Smee et al. (2003) Table 2.1
specified locations and times, by physically changing them. For example, organisms
secrete chemicals, exploit resources, and construct artifacts. Relocation refers to
cases in which organisms actively move in space, choosing not only the direction
and/or the distance in space through which they travel but sometimes the time when
they travel. In the process, relocating organisms expose themselves to alternative
habitats, at different times, and thus to different environmental factors.
The second dichotomous category of niche construction focuses on whether
organisms initiate or respond to a change in an environmental factor, such as a
conventional resource or condition. Odling-Smee et al. (2003) describe as inceptive
niche construction all cases in which organisms initiate changes in any factor,
through either perturbation or relocation. Organisms express inceptive niche
construction when by their activities they generate a change in the environment to
which they are exposed. Conversely, if an environmental factor is already changing,
or has changed, organisms may oppose or cancel out that change, a process labeled
counteractive niche construction. They thereby restore a match between their
previously evolved features and their environment's factors. Counteractive niche
construction is therefore conservative or stabilizing, and it generally functions to
protect organisms from shifts in factors away from states to which they have been
adapted.
From the above, it is apparent that niche construction is an extremely general process
and that humans are far from alone in their capacity to modify the environment in
significant ways. Nonetheless, human niche construction may be uniquely potent. In
the last 100,000 years, humans have dispersed from East Africa around the globe
and exhibited massive population growth. This success story would not have been
possible without their ability to modify environments to compensate for different
climatic regimes and other challenges—manufacturing clothes and shelters,
controlling fire, devising agricultural practices, and domesticating livestock. The
basis for human success as a species is the inordinately high capacity for learning
that its members possess. The significance of acquired characters to evolutionary
Laland and O’Brien
Hundreds of species of mammals, birds, and fishes are now known to learn socially
(Zentall and Galef 1988; Heyes and Galef 1996), allowing novel learned traits to
sweep through populations and exposing individuals to novel selection pressures.
This process is further amplified with stable transgenerational culture, and it is now
widely believed that such characters were probably important to hominin evolution
(Cavalli-Sforza and Feldman 1981; Richerson and Boyd 2005).
Theoretical analyses exploring the evolutionary ramifications of human cultural
niche construction show it to be potent. Laland et al. (2001) found that cultural niche
construction could overwhelm, or reverse, natural selection, accelerate the rate at
which a favored gene spreads, initiate novel evolutionary events, and trigger
hominin speciation. They concluded that, because cultural processes typically
operate faster than natural selection, cultural niche construction probably has more
profound consequences than gene-based niche construction.
Gene–culture co-evolution may even be the dominant form of evolutionary
adaptation for our species (Laland et al. 2010). Moreover, it also has driven co-
evolutionary interactions with other species, including domesticated animals and
plants, commensal species adapted to human-constructed environments (e.g., rats,
mice, and insects), and microbes (Boni and Feldman 2005; Smith 2007a, b).
Previous studies of the ecological impact of niche construction reveal that organisms
can transform ecosystems not just by outcompeting and directly consuming other
species but also by constructing and destroying habitat and resources used by other
species (Jones et al. 1994, 1997; Odling-Smee et al. 2003), a point germane to our
own species. After all, there currently is great concern that human activities are
precipitating a major global extinction (Wilson 1992), but few environmentalists
believe that this tragedy is brought about exclusively through our predatory
behavior. Siberian tigers, golden lion tamarins, checkerspot butterflies, and millions
of other endangered species are vulnerable not primarily because we eat them or
their predators but because of our habitat degradation, deforestation, industrial and
urban development, agricultural practices, livestock grazing, pesticide use, and so
forth—that is, our niche construction. Such activities destroy the (engineering)
control webs that underlie ecosystems.
Such considerations naturally raise the question of in what way NCT differs from the
conventional view of co-evolution (e.g., Ehrlich and Raven 1964). It is true that in
the ecology and evolution literature, there is a considerable body of formal theory
that models aspects of niche construction and its consequences. Ecological models
of competition through resource depletion and evolutionary models of habitat
selection are two of the more obvious examples. In these and other bodies of theory
(reviewed by Odling-Smee et al. 2003), there is recognition of the feedback between
organismic activity and the environment. Some of this theory includes niche
construction as a process in its own right, although this is rarely acknowledged in
conceptual or verbal accounts. Yet, while the basic insight that feedback between
niche-constructing organisms and their environments occurs, and that it can have
profound effects on evolutionary dynamics, is hardly novel, it is often obscured in
NCT and Archaeology
virtually ignored) by current evolutionary theory. They do, however, resonate with
archaeologists, as we discuss below.
The important point here is that theoretical frameworks channel thinking,
encouraging researchers to embrace certain processes and explanations and to
neglect others. NCT is heuristically valuable precisely because it draws our
attention to a range of phenomena that are both important and easy to overlook
using only standard perspectives (Laland and Sterelny 2006). Because it extends
and builds on traditional dual inheritance (genetic and cultural) models of cultural
evolution that have provided significant insights into human behavior (e.g.,
Cavalli-Sforza and Feldman 1981; Boyd and Richerson 1985; Durham 1991), NCT
is sometimes referred to as “triple-inheritance theory” (genetic, cultural, and
ecological inheritance; e.g., Odling-Smee et al. 1996, 2003; Laland et al. 1999,
2000, 2001; Day et al. 2003; Shennan 2006).
Odling-Smee et al. (2003, p. 282) acknowledge that “if niche construction is going
to pay its way as a scientific construct it must stimulate useful empirical work.”
Accordingly, they devoted three chapters of their monograph to cataloging empirical
methods. Rather than detail such methods here, we refer the reader to that source and
content ourselves with making three points.
First, NCT offers an alternative means of thinking about problems and, as a result,
frequently brings with it a suite of novel hypotheses and explanations. This fertility
is apparent in the numerous applications of NCT within countless disciplines. In
essence, NCT is of value because it draws attention to the active agency of the
organism as a source of ecological and evolutionary change. Accordingly, rather
than slipping into the assumption that the external environment (e.g., climate
change) triggers an evolutionary or cultural response, NCT enthusiasts are from the
outset inclined to consider those additional hypotheses stressing self-constructed
(and other organism-constructed) conditions that instigate change. In this respect,
NCT can be viewed as more in accord with the perspective of most archaeologists,
who are highly attuned to the active agency of their subjects, than standard
evolutionary theory (e.g., Dobres 2000; Dobres and Robb 2000; VanPool and
VanPool 2003).
Second, NCT offers a variety of methods for testing niche construction
hypotheses (Odling-Smee et al. 2003). One of the more pertinent here is using the
comparative method to detect the dependence of the evolution of recipient traits on
the prior evolution of niche-constructing traits (see also Broughton et al., this
volume). In principle, for any clade of organisms, it should be possible to determine,
using established comparative statistical methods (Harvey and Pagel 1991), those
phenotypic characters (recipient traits) that might have been selected as a
consequence of feedback from prior niche-constructing traits. Pertinent characters
could be measured in closely related organisms that do and do not exhibit this niche
construction, or in different populations of the same species. It would then be
possible to use statistical methods to determine if the recipient character changes
correlate with niche-constructing activity and whether the characters are derived. At
NCT and Archaeology
the very least, this would establish that the niche-constructing trait preceded the
evolution of the recipient trait and may determine to what extent the niche-
constructing trait is necessary for the evolution of the recipient trait. Such methods
can also be used to determine whether changes in a selected recipient character
correlate with a particular niche-constructing activity, whether the niche-constructing
activity is typically ancestral to the recipient character, and whether the recipient
character in question is derived. There should be a significant relationship between
the pertinent environmental state and the recipient character only when the niche-
constructing activity is also present. The same logic applies at the cultural level, and
the same methods can be applied to hominins or to contemporary human
populations, where they may shed light on the relationship between different kinds
of cultural niche construction and their different consequences.
The methods can be applied even if one of the traits is gene-based in order to
explore gene–culture co-evolution, using genetic signatures of cultural niche
construction (see below). In addition, such methods can be deployed to test specific
predictions. For instance, Laland et al. (2001) propose that patterns of response to
selection may depend on the capacity for niche construction. Many counteractive
niche-constructing behaviors regulate the environment in such a way as to buffer
against particular natural selection pressures. As a consequence, potent niche
constructors should be more resistant to genetic evolution in autonomously changing
environments than less-able niche constructors. An example of the application of this
reasoning is given in the next section.
Third, Odling-Smee et al. (2003) describe different types of feedback from
cultural niche construction and suggest how each might generate a different
detectable signature. They use this notion of signature to illustrate methods that
can be employed to detect significant evolutionary ramifications of human cultural
niche construction. Many such signatures are familiar to archaeologists—for
example, fishhooks, harpoons, and nets are obviously signatures of fishing activity.
However, signatures of niche construction also include genes that have been favored
in populations as a result of selection modified by cultural practices. For example,
the high frequency of the lactose absorption gene LTP, the hemoglobin HbS allele,
and the G6PD gene in particular populations are all signatures of prior cultural
niche-constructing activities, namely, dairy farming, yam cultivation, and fava
cultivation, respectively (Odling-Smee et al. 2003). Many potential signature genes
have recently been identified in analyses of the human genome, seemingly favored over
recent millennia because of human cultural practices (Voight et al. 2006; Wang et al.
2006; Laland et al. 2010). The hemoglobin HbS and G6PD alleles are interesting
because agricultural practices have intensified selection of them by inadvertently
affecting the prevalence of malaria. More generally, from gene frequencies, we can
draw inferences about ancestral human activities, given that human modifications of
the environment triggered or modified selection on human genes.
than other mammals. More culturally sophisticated hominins should colonize faster
than less culturally sophisticated hominins. Were such patterns to be confirmed, it
might be possible to reverse this inference and to draw conclusions about the
potency of a population's niche construction on the basis of its rate of colonization.
Concluding Remarks
Acknowledgments We thank Lydia Pyne and Julien Riel-Salvatore for inviting us to participate in
the Society for American Archaeology session on niche construction and John Odling-Smee for
NCT and Archaeology
helpful comments on an earlier draft. A very helpful anonymous reviewer caused us to sharpen our
focus. KNL thanks the Royal Society and EU (NEST-Pathfinder, Cultaptation) for providing financial
support.
References
Abrams, P. A., & Matsuda, H. (1996). Positive indirect effects between prey species that share predators.
Ecology, 77, 610–616.
Balter, M. (2005). Are humans still evolving? Science, 309, 234–237.
Bardone, E., & Magnani, L. (2007). Sharing representations through cognitive niche construction. Data
Science Journal, 6, S87–S91.
Barker, G. (2008). Biological levers and extended adaptationism. Biology and Philosophy, 23, 1–25.
Barlow, K. R. (2002). Predicting maize agriculture among the Fremont: An economic comparison of
farming and foraging in the American Southwest. American Antiquity, 67, 65–88.
Bellwood, P. S. (2005). First farmers: The origins of agricultural societies. Oxford: Blackwell.
Bleed, P. (2006). Living in the human niche. Evolutionary Anthropology, 15, 8–10.
Boni, M. F., & Feldman, M. W. (2005). Evolution of antibiotic resistance by human and bacterial niche
construction. Evolution, 59, 477–491.
Borenstein, E., Kendal, J., & Feldman, M. W. (2006). Cultural niche construction in a metapopulation.
Theoretical Population Biology, 70, 92–104.
Boserup, E. (1965). The conditions of agricultural growth. Chicago: Aldine.
Boserup, E. (1981). Population and technological change. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Boyd, R., & Richerson, P. J. (1985). Culture and the evolutionary process. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press.
Braidwood, R. J. (1960). The agricultural revolution. Scientific American, 203, 130–148.
Broughton, J. M. (2002). Prey spatial structure and behavior affect archaeological tests of optimal
foraging models: Examples from the Emeryville shellmound vertebrate fauna. World Archaeology,
34, 60–83.
Burger, J., Kirchner, M., Bramanti, B., Haak, W., & Thomas, M. G. (2007). Absence of the lactase-
persistence-associated allele in early Neolithic Europeans. Proceedings of the National Academy of
Science, 104, 3736–3741.
Burroughs, W. (2005). Climate change in prehistory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Cannon, M. D. (2000). Large mammal relative abundance in Pithouse and Pueblo period archaeofaunas
from southwestern New Mexico: Resource depression among the Mimbres-Mogollon? Journal of
Anthropological Archaeology, 19, 317–347.
Cavalli-Sforza, L. L., & Feldman, M. W. (1981). Cultural transmission and evolution: A quantitative
approach. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Childe, V. G. (1936). Man makes himself. London: Watts.
Cochran, G., & Harpending, H. (2009). The 10,000 year explosion: How civilization accelerated human
evolution. New York: Basic Books.
Cohen, M. N. (1977). The food crisis in prehistory. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Dawkins, R. (1976). The selfish gene. New York: Oxford University Press.
Dawkins, R. (1990). The extended phenotype: The long reach of the gene (new ed.). Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Day, R. L., Laland, K. N., Odling-Smee, F. J., & Feldman, M. W. (2003). Rethinking adaptation: The
niche construction perspective. Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 46, 80–95.
Dobres, M.-A. (2000). Technology and social agency. Oxford: Blackwell.
Dobres, M.-A., & Robb, J. (2000). Agency in archaeology: Paradigm or platitude? In M.-A. Dobres & J.
Robb (Eds.), Agency in archaeology (pp. 3–17). New York: Routledge.
Donohue, K. (2005). Niche construction through phonological plasticity: Life history dynamics and
ecological consequences. The New Phytologist, 166, 83–92.
Dunnell, R. C. (1980). Evolutionary theory and archaeology. Advances in Archaeological Method and
Theory, 3, 35–99.
Durham, W. H. (1991). Coevolution: Genes, culture, and human diversity. Stanford: Stanford University
Press.
Ehrlich, P. R., & Raven, P. H. (1964). Butterflies and plants: A study in coevolution. Evolution, 18, 586–
608.
Laland and O’Brien
Feldman, M. W., & Cavalli-Sforza, L. L. (1989). On the theory of evolution under genetic and cultural
transmission with application to the lactose absorption problem. In M. W. Feldman (Ed.),
Mathematical evolutionary theory (pp. 145–173). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Flack, J. C., Girvan, M., de Waal, F. B. M., & Krakauer, D. C. (2006). Policing stabilizes construction of
social niches in primates. Nature, 439, 426–429.
Flannery, K. V. (1986). Adaptation, evolution, and archaeological phases: Some implications of Reynolds'
simulation. In K. V. Flannery (Ed.), Guilá Naquitz: Archaic foraging and early agriculture in Oaxaca
(pp. 501–507). Orlando: Academic.
Fragaszy, D., & Perry, S. (Eds.). (2003). The biology of traditions: Models and evidence. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Fragaszy, D., & Visalberghi, E. (2001). Recognizing a swan: Socially-biased learning. Psychologia, 44,
82–98.
Futuyma, D. J., & Slatkin, M. (Eds.). (1983). Coevolution. Sunderland, MA: Sinauer.
Gavrilets, S. (1997). Coevolutionary chase in exploiter-victim systems with polygenic characters. Journal
of Theoretical Biology, 186, 527–534.
Godfrey-Smith, P. (1998). Complexity and the function of mind in nature. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Hardesty, D. L. (1972). The human ecological niche. American Anthropologist, 74, 458–466.
Harvey, P. H., & Pagel, M. D. (1991). The comparative method in evolutionary biology. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Hawks, J., Wang, E. T., Cochran, G. M., Harpending, H. C., & Mayzis, R. K. (2007). Recent acceleration
of human adaptive evolution. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 104, 20753–20758.
Hawley, W. A., Reiter, P., Copeland, R. S., Pumpuni, C. B., & Craig, G. B. (1987). Aedes albopictus in
North America: Probable introduction in used tires from Northern Asia. Science, 236, 1114–1116.
Haygood, R., Fedrigo, O., Hanson, B., Yokoyama, K. D., & Wray, G. A. (2007). Promoter regions of
many neural- and nutrition-related genes have experienced positive selection during human evolution.
Nature Genetics, 39, 1140–1144.
Heesterbeek, J. A. P., & Roberts, M. G. (1995). Threshold quantities for helminth infections. Journal of
Mathematical Biology, 33, 415–434.
Heiser, C. (1990). Seed to civilization. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Heyes, C., & Galef, B. G. (1996). Social learning in animals: The roots of culture. New York: Academic.
Holden, C. J., & Mace, R. (1997). Phylogenetic analysis of the evolution of lactose digestion in adults.
Human Biology, 69, 605–628.
Ihara, Y., & Feldman, M. W. (2004). Cultural niche construction and the evolution of small family size.
Theoretical Population Biology, 65, 105–111.
Iriki, A., & Sakura, O. (2008). The neuroscience of primate intellectual evolution: Natural selection and
passive and intentional niche construction. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 363,
2229–2241.
Jones, C. G., Lawton, G. H., & Shachak, M. (1994). Organisms as ecosystem engineers. Oikos, 69, 373–386.
Jones, C. G., Lawton, G. H., & Shachak, M. (1997). Ecosystem engineering by organisms: Why semantics
matters. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 12, 275.
Kelley, J. L., & Swanson, W. J. (2008). Dietary change and adaptive evolution of enamelin in humans and
among primates. Genetics, 178, 1595–1603.
Kendal, J., Ihara, Y., & Feldman, M. W. (2005). Cultural niche construction with application to fertility
control: A model for education and social transmission of contraceptive use. Palo Alto, CA: Morrison
Institute for Population and Resource Studies, Stanford University, Paper 102.
Kylafis, G., & Loreau, M. (2008). Ecological and evolutionary consequences of niche construction for its
agent. Ecological Letters, 11, 1072–1081.
Laland, K. N., & Brown, G. R. (2006). Niche construction, human behavior, and the adaptive-lag
hypothesis. Evolutionary Anthropology, 15, 95–104.
Laland, K. N., Kendal, J. R., & Brown, G. R. (2008). The niche construction perspective: Implications for
evolution and human behaviour. Journal of Evolutionary Psychology, 5, 51–66.
Laland, K. N., Odling-Smee, F. J., & Feldman, M. W. (1996). On the evolutionary consequences of niche
construction. Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 9, 293–316.
Laland, K. N., Odling-Smee, F. J., & Feldman, M. W. (1999). Evolutionary consequences of niche
construction and their implications for ecology. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 96,
10242–10247.
Laland, K. N., Odling-Smee, F. J., & Feldman, M. W. (2000). Niche construction, biological evolution,
and cultural change. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 23, 131–175.
NCT and Archaeology
Laland, K. N., Odling-Smee, F. J., & Feldman, M. W. (2001). Cultural niche construction and human
evolution. Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 14, 22–33.
Laland, K. N., Odling-Smee, F. J., & Feldman, M. W. (2005). On the breadth and significance of niche
construction. A reply to Griffiths, Okasha and Sterelny. Biology and Philosophy, 20, 37–55.
Laland, K. N., Odling-Smee, F. J., & Myles, S. (2010). How culture shaped the human genome: Bringing
genetics and the human sciences together. Nature Reviews. Genetics, 11, 137–148.
Laland, K. N., & Sterelny, K. (2006). Seven reasons (not) to neglect niche construction. Evolution, 60,
1751–1762.
Lehmann, L. (2008). The adaptive dynamics of niche constructing traits in spatially subdivided
populations: Evolving posthumous extended phenotypes. Evolution, 62, 549–566.
Lewontin, R. C. (1982). Organism and environment. In H. C. Plotkin (Ed.), Learning, development and
culture (pp. 151–170). New York: Wiley.
Lewontin, R. C. (1983). Gene, organism, and environment. In D. S. Bendall (Ed.), Evolution from
molecules to men (pp. 273–285). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lewontin, R. C. (2000). The triple helix: Gene, organism, and environment. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press.
Mameli, M. (2001). Mindreading, mindshaping and evolution. Biology and Philosophy, 16, 597–628.
Marrow, P., Dieckmann, U., & Law, R. (1996). Evolutionary dynamics of predator prey systems: An
ecological perspective. Journal of Mathematical Biology, 34, 556–578.
Mesoudi, A. (2008). Foresight in cultural evolution. Biology and Philosophy, 23, 243–255.
Naiman, R. J., Johnston, C. A., & Kelley, J. C. (1988). Alterations of North American streams by beaver.
Bioscience, 38, 753–762.
O'Brien, M. J. (1987). Sedentism, population growth, and resource selection in the Woodland Midwest: A
review of coevolutionary developments. Current Anthropology, 28, 177–197.
O'Brien, M. J., & Holland, T. D. (1990). Variation, selection, and the archaeological record. In M. B. Schiffer
(Ed.), Archaeological method and theory (Vol. 2, pp. 31–79). Tucson: University of Arizona Press.
O'Brien, M. J., & Holland, T. D. (1992). The role of adaptation in archaeological explanation. American
Antiquity, 57, 36–59.
O'Brien, M. J., & Wilson, H. C. (1988). A paradigmatic shift in the search for the origin of agriculture.
American Anthropologist, 90, 958–965.
Odling-Smee, F. J. (1988). Niche constructing phenotypes. In H. C. Plotkin (Ed.), The role of behavior in
evolution (pp. 31–79). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Odling-Smee, F. J., Laland, K. N., & Feldman, M. W. (1996). Niche construction. American Naturalist,
147, 641–648.
Odling-Smee, F. J., Laland, K. N., & Feldman, M. W. (2003). Niche construction: The neglected process
in evolution. Monographs in population biology 37. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Oyama, S., Griffiths, P. E., & Gray, R. D. (2001). Cycles of contingency: Developmental systems and
evolution. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Perry, G. H., et al. (2007). Diet and the evolution of human amylase gene copy number variation. Nature
Genetics, 39, 1256–1260.
Pryor, F. L. (1986). The adoption of agriculture: Some theoretical and empirical evidence. American
Anthropologist, 88, 879–897.
Reed, C. A. (1977). Conclusions. In C. A. Reed (Ed.), Origins of agriculture (pp. 1013–1014). The
Hague: Mouton.
Richards, M. P., Schulting, R. J., & Hedges, R. E. M. (2003). Archaeology: Sharp shift in diet at onset of
Neolithic. Nature, 425, 366.
Richerson, P. J., & Boyd, R. (2005). Not by genes alone. Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Richerson, P., Boyd, R., & Bettinger, R. (2001). Was agriculture impossible during the Pleistocene but
mandatory during the Holocene? American Antiquity, 66, 387–411.
Rindos, D. (1980). Symbiosis, instability, and the origins and spread of agriculture: A new model. Current
Anthropology, 21, 751–772.
Rindos, D. (1984). The origins of agriculture: An evolutionary perspective. New York: Academic.
Rouse, I. B. (1939). Prehistory in Haiti: A study in method. New Haven, CT: Yale University Publications
in Anthropology, no. 21.
Shennan, S. J. (2006). From cultural history to cultural evolution: An archaeological perspective on social
information transmission. In J. C. K. Wells, S. Strickland, & K. N. Laland (Eds.), Social information
transmission and human biology (pp. 173–190). London: CRC Press.
Silver, M., & Di Paolo, E. (2006). Spatial effects favour the evolution of niche construction. Theoretical
Population Biology, 70, 387–400.
Laland and O’Brien