Working Memory and the Evolution of Modern Thinking

Wenner-Gren Symposium Supplement 1

Bibliographic Data

ID2221692
AuthorsLeslie C Aiello (0000-0001-9546-0963, corresponding author)
Year2010
Volume51
IssueS1
PagesS3-S4
Publication date2010-06-01
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueCurrent Anthropology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0011-3204 • E-ISSN: 1537-5382
PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1086/651450
OpenAlexW2132792746
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited5

Previous articleNext article FreeWorking Memory and the Evolution of Modern Thinking Wenner-Gren Symposium Supplement 1by Leslie C. Aielloby Leslie C. Aiello Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMore"Working Memory and the Evolution of Modern Thinking" is the 139th numbered Wenner-Gren Symposium and the 168th symposium in the overall Wenner-Gren symposium series.1 The symposium was organized by anthropologist Thomas Wynn and psychologist Frederick Coolidge and held March 7-14, 2008, at Fortaleza do Guincho, Cascais, Portugal. Its purpose was to investigate the hypothesis that working-memory capacity evolved over the course of human evolution and that its final enhancement in the recent past enabled the rapid expansion of modern humans at the expense of more archaic hominins.Working memory, the ability to hold information in attention and process it, has been the focus of considerable research in the cognitive sciences but has received relatively little attention among anthropologists. This symposium brought together cognitive scientists involved in the study of working memory with paleoanthropologists studying human evolution to discuss and debate issues around the evolution of working memory and its manifestation in the human evolutionary record. (Participants are shown in fig. 1.)Figure 1. Participants in the "Working Memory and the Evolution of Modern Thinking" symposium. Seated from left: April Nowell, Anna Belfer-Cohen, Alexandra Sumner, Lyn Wadley, Leslie Aiello, Fatima Pinto (Wenner-Gren staff), Miriam Haidle. Standing from left: Francisco Aboitiz, Stanley Ambrose, Rex Welshon, Tom Wynn, Eric Reuland, Matt Rossano, Randall Engle, Fred Coolidge, Iain Davidson, Manuel Martín-Loeches, Philip Barnard. Not pictured: Emiliano Bruner.View Large ImageDownload PowerPointAlthough there was no general agreement on the nature of working memory, there was consensus on the importance of an explicit cognitive theory such as working memory to generate appropriate tests of cognitive development. For example, all agreed on the importance of expanding the archaeological evidence of modern human cognition from, say, the presence of blades or personal ornamentation to features such as hafting, complex sequences of tool production, remotely operated traps, and colonization of oceanic islands.This symposium builds on earlier Wenner-Gren Symposia that have explored human cognitive and behavioral evolution, including Tools, Language and Cognition in Human Evolution (Gibson and Ingold 1993) and Roots of Human Sociality: Culture, Cognition and Interaction (Enfield and Levinson 2006). The foundation also has a long history of symposia on various aspects of human and primate evolution including, among many others, Social Life of Early Man (Washburn 1961), Background to Evolution in Africa (Bishop and Clark 1967), Earliest Man and Environments in the Lake Rudolf Basin (Coppens et al. 1976), and Phylogeny of the Primates: A Multidisciplinary Approach (Luckett and Szalay 1975).1The numbering system began with the first symposium held at Burg Wartenstein Castle in 1958 (the "International Symposium on Current Anthropology" organized by Sol Tax). During the castle years only those symposia actually held at the castle were numbered. After the sale of the castle in 1980, the symposia held elsewhere continued the numbered sequence. There were 31 nonnumbered symposia held between 1952 and 1986.References CitedBishop, Walter W., and J. Desmond Clark, eds. 1967. Background to evolution in Africa. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.First citation in articleGoogle ScholarCoppens, Yves, F. Clark Howell, Glynn L. Isaac, and Richard Leakey, eds. 1976. Earliest man and environments in the Lake Rudolf Basin: stratigraphy, paleoecology, and evolution. Prehistoric Archeology and Ecology Series. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.First citation in articleGoogle ScholarEnfield, Nicholas J., and Stephen C. Levinson, eds. 2006. Roots of human sociality: culture, cognition and interaction. Wenner-Gren International Symposium Series. Oxford: Berg.First citation in articleGoogle ScholarGibson, Kathleen R., and Tim Ingold, eds. 1993. Tools, language and cognition in human evolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.First citation in articleGoogle ScholarLuckett, W. Patrick, and Frederick S. Szalay, eds. 1975. Phylogeny of the primates: a multidisciplinary approach. New York: Plenum.First citation in articleGoogle ScholarWashburn, Sherwood Larned, ed. 1961. Social life of early man. Viking Fund Publications in Anthropology 31. New York: Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, distributed through Current Anthropology.First citation in articleGoogle Scholar Previous articleNext article DetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Current Anthropology Volume 51, Number S1June 2010Working Memory: Beyond Language and Symbolism Sponsored by the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/651450 Views: 308Total views on this site (c) 2010 by The Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. All rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article

Cognition · Cognitive science · Human evolution · Sociology · Working memory · Wynn · Anthropology · Memory and Neural Mechanisms · Philosophy · Psychology

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