Frequency-Dependent Social Transmission and the Interethnic Transfer of Female Genital Modification in the African Diaspora and Indigenous Populations of Colombia

Abstract

We present a quantitative account based on ethnographic and documentary research of the prevalence of female genital modification (FGMo) in the African diaspora and indigenous populations of Colombia. We use these data to test hypotheses concerning the cultural evolutionary drivers of costly trait persistence, attenuation, and intergroup transmission. The uptake of FGMo by indigenous populations in Colombia is consistent with frequency-dependent hypotheses for the social transmission of the FGMo trait from the African diaspora population in the period following the era of slavery in Colombia. The prevalence and severity of practices related to FGMo decline with level of sociocultural integration into mainstream Colombian culture. Our results provide empirical support for the cultural evolutionary models proposed by Ross et al. (2015) to describe the transmission dynamics of FGMo and other costly traits. Analysis of costly trait dynamics contributes knowledge useful to applied anthropology and may be of interest in policy design and human rights monitoring in Colombia and elsewhere.Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article

Frequency-dependent female genital cutting behaviour confers evolutionary fitness benefits

“…It often used as an explanation for the spread of neutral or maladaptive behaviours, as behaviours are adopted based on frequency without evaluation of merit. To date studies of conformity have mostly used modelling and experimental data, however positive frequency-dependent transmission is gaining popularity as an explanation for FGC persistence 23,24 and evidence of frequency-dependent maintenance of FGC has been found in one empirical study 25 .…”

Diagnosis, Management, and Treatment of Female Genital Mutilation or Cutting in Girls

“…14 However, FGM/C also occurs with unknown frequency in Yemen, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, northern Iraq, India, Malaysia, and Indonesia 15 and has been reported to occur sporadically in Russia 16, 17 and Colombia. 18 The practice of FGM/C is not uniformly performed throughout any given country and may be clustered on the basis of economic status, level of education, rural versus urban geographic location, ethnic and/or tribal affiliation, and religious beliefs. In half of the countries with available data on FGM/C prevalence, most girls have had FGM/C performed before 5 years of age (see Fig 2).…”

“…Countries where FGM/C is practiced with unknown frequency and not pictured on this map include Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, India, Malaysia, Russia, and Colombia. [15][16][17][18] South Sudan seceded from Sudan in 2011 but is not noted on this map. 107 Reproduced with permission from United Nations Population Fund.…”

Data on the frequency of non-reproductive adults in a cross-cultural sample of small-scale human societies

“…[j] and Z F [j] . Following the multi-level meta-analysis model outlined in Ross et al (2015), we adopt a model where each population/cultural group has its own binomial probability distribution for remaining non-reproductive until age 25 in model 1 (and age 45 in model 2); we describe this probability distribution using the posterior distributions of parameters θ M…”