Correlates of Language Change in Hunter‐Gatherer and Other ‘Small’ Languages

Bowern, Claire

doi:10.1111/j.1749-818x.2010.00220.x

Cited by 22 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 68 publications

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“…The observation that rate of gain of new words is greater in larger populations is compatible with the establishment of new words by a process analogous to positive selection. An alternative explanation for this pattern is that smaller populations might have denser social networks that tend to be conservatizing, enforcing linguistic norms and resisting change (5,11,38).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Rate of language evolution is affected by population size

Bromham

Hua

Fitzpatrick

et al. 2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

101

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The effect of population size on patterns and rates of language evolution is controversial. Do languages with larger speaker populations change faster due to a greater capacity for innovation, or do smaller populations change faster due to more efficient diffusion of innovations? Do smaller populations suffer greater loss of language elements through founder effects or drift, or do languages with more speakers lose features due to a process of simplification? Revealing the influence of population size on the tempo and mode of language evolution not only will clarify underlying mechanisms of language change but also has practical implications for the way that language data are used to reconstruct the history of human cultures. Here, we provide, to our knowledge, the first empirical, statistically robust test of the influence of population size on rates of language evolution, controlling for the evolutionary history of the populations and formally comparing the fit of different models of language evolution. We compare rates of gain and loss of cognate words for basic vocabulary in Polynesian languages, an ideal test case with a well-defined history. We demonstrate that larger populations have higher rates of gain of new words whereas smaller populations have higher rates of word loss. These results show that demographic factors can influence rates of language evolution and that rates of gain and loss are affected differently. These findings are strikingly consistent with general predictions of evolutionary models. language evolution | sister-pair comparison | Austronesian | lexical change | Poisson regression P opulation size can play a crucial role in the evolution of languages and cultures (1). However, opinions differ on both the possible mechanisms and the expected patterns (2-7). It has been suggested that larger populations will generate more innovations and are less prone to random loss of cultural elements (8-10), but may have less efficient diffusion of innovations than smaller populations (4). Alternatively, languages spoken by small isolated populations of speakers may have lower rates of loss if they maintain tighter cultural norms that improve transmission and resist change (11). Rates of change might be accelerated by founder effects when a new population is started from a small number of colonists, which could result in loss of elements from the ancestral language (11-13). Population size might also influence language complexity if small populations can develop greater linguistic complexity (11), whereas large, widespread languages that are often learned by adults may become simplified (14). Conversely, it has been suggested that the average rate of word turnover is essentially the same in all languages (15-17), or that it is determined primarily by other factors such as language contact (6, 18).Uncovering systematic patterns of rates of language change may reveal underlying mechanisms of language evolution (13,19). In particular, investigating rates of language change can demonstrate whether langua...

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, opinions differ on both the possible mechanisms and the expected patterns (2)(3)(4)(5)(6)(7). It has been suggested that larger populations will generate more innovations and are less prone to random loss of cultural elements (8)(9)(10), but may have less efficient diffusion of innovations than smaller populations (4).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Rate of language evolution is affected by population size

Bromham

Hua

Fitzpatrick

et al. 2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

101

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show abstract

“…It has been suggested that larger populations should have higher rates of language change, because populations containing more individuals provide more opportunity for innovations to arise (Richerson et al, 2009 ; Kline and Boyd, 2010 ; Baldini, 2015 ). Large populations might also be less prone to random sampling effects that can cause elements of language and culture to be lost (Shennan, 2001 ; Henrich, 2004 ; Kline and Boyd, 2010 ; Collard et al, 2013 ) and they may have less stringent norm enforcement allowing them to change faster (Bowern, 2010 ; Trudgill, 2011 ). Larger populations might also have more robust transmission systems: having more people to learn from might increase fidelity of information transition (Derex et al, 2013 ), possibly because learners in large populations have a large set of potential models to learn from (Henrich, 2004 ; Kline and Boyd, 2010 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Further, it has been suggested that the rate of language change may be accelerated by serial founder effects as new languages are started from relative small populations (Atkinson et al, 2008 ), which could increase the rate of loss of language elements from the ancestral language (Trudgill, 2004 ; Atkinson, 2011 ). Small speaker populations may also be more influenced by language contact through trade and marriage across groups, which might increase rates of language change (Bowern, 2010 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Population Size and the Rate of Language Evolution: A Test Across Indo-European, Austronesian, and Bantu Languages

et al. 2018

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What role does speaker population size play in shaping rates of language evolution? There has been little consensus on the expected relationship between rates and patterns of language change and speaker population size, with some predicting faster rates of change in smaller populations, and others expecting greater change in larger populations. The growth of comparative databases has allowed population size effects to be investigated across a wide range of language groups, with mixed results. One recent study of a group of Polynesian languages revealed greater rates of word gain in larger populations and greater rates of word loss in smaller populations. However, that test was restricted to 20 closely related languages from small Oceanic islands. Here, we test if this pattern is a general feature of language evolution across a larger and more diverse sample of languages from both continental and island populations. We analyzed comparative language data for 153 pairs of closely-related sister languages from three of the world's largest language families: Austronesian, Indo-European, and Niger-Congo. We find some evidence that rates of word loss are significantly greater in smaller languages for the Indo-European comparisons, but we find no significant patterns in the other two language families. These results suggest either that the influence of population size on rates and patterns of language evolution is not universal, or that it is sufficiently weak that it may be overwhelmed by other influences in some cases. Further investigation, for a greater number of language comparisons and a wider range of language features, may determine which of these explanations holds true.

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“…Thus, it is quite unlikely that we would have developed a dedicated cognitive system in order to be able to categorize people on the basis of race-related physical properties. In the case of language, however, since linguistic variations could evolve in geographically neighboring areas, even short-distance traveling allowed contact with different speakers ( Kelly, 1995 ; Bowern, 2010 ). Hence, exposure to different languages and accents was most probably a recurrent feature in the environment of our ancestors, leading to the emergence of a cognitive system that is dedicated to categorize people on the basis of lingusitic cues.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Infants’ Selectively Pay Attention to the Information They Receive from a Native Speaker of Their Language

et al. 2016

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From the first moments of their life, infants show a preference for their native language, as well as toward speakers with whom they share the same language. This preference appears to have broad consequences in various domains later on, supporting group affiliations and collaborative actions in children. Here, we propose that infants’ preference for native speakers of their language also serves a further purpose, specifically allowing them to efficiently acquire culture specific knowledge via social learning. By selectively attending to informants who are native speakers of their language and who probably also share the same cultural background with the infant, young learners can maximize the possibility to acquire cultural knowledge. To test whether infants would preferably attend the information they receive from a speaker of their native language, we familiarized 12-month-old infants with a native and a foreign speaker, and then presented them with movies where each of the speakers silently gazed toward unfamiliar objects. At test, infants’ looking behavior to the two objects alone was measured. Results revealed that infants preferred to look longer at the object presented by the native speaker. Strikingly, the effect was replicated also with 5-month-old infants, indicating an early development of such preference. These findings provide evidence that young infants pay more attention to the information presented by a person with whom they share the same language. This selectivity can serve as a basis for efficient social learning by influencing how infants’ allocate attention between potential sources of information in their environment.

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Correlates of Language Change in Hunter‐Gatherer and Other ‘Small’ Languages

Cited by 22 publications

References 68 publications

Rate of language evolution is affected by population size

Rate of language evolution is affected by population size

Population Size and the Rate of Language Evolution: A Test Across Indo-European, Austronesian, and Bantu Languages

Infants’ Selectively Pay Attention to the Information They Receive from a Native Speaker of Their Language

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