Hadza hunter-gatherers disagree on perceptions of moral character

Abstract

To the extent that moral character is grounded in stable and observable truths, there should exist agreement between people in their judgements of others’ character. In Western populations, this agreement is found. We examine whether this is universal in Hadza hunter-gatherers of Tanzania. Ninety-four judges ranked their campmates on global character and relevant character traits for a total of 824 observations. Judges disagreed on rankings of global character, generosity, and honesty, but agreed more on hard work and hunting ability. Individual rankings on specific traits predicted character evaluations. There was agreement between judges on the extent to which generosity and hard work related to character. These findings suggest that Hadza have shared beliefs about what traits constitute character, but disagree on which of their campmates exhibit these traits. We discuss these findings in light of other research suggesting that stable moral dispositions may not be universal.

Partner choice in human evolution: The role of cooperation, foraging ability, and culture in Hadza campmate preferences

“…Consistent with predictions from models of partner choice, and data from WEIRD subjects, we find evidence that Hadza hunter-gatherers do prefer to live with people they deem as more cooperative. These results contrast with results from several papers citing little evidence for partner choice maintaining cooperation in the Hadza, including a lack of preference for more cooperative campmates (Apicella et al, 2012;Smith et al, 2018;Smith & Apicella, 2020). We also find that while the preference for generous campmates has strengthened, the preference for productive foragers has weakened.…”

“…If cooperation went to fixation, individuals would no longer benefit from discriminating between partners and the preference for cooperative partners would weaken or disappear (with enough time). Thus, it is possible that the lack of preference for cooperative campmates observed in 2010 or even the disagreement observed in our current ranking data (Smith & Apicella, 2020) may reflect a long history of partner choice.…”

“…This same study also found no evidence that individual cooperative behavior is stable over time. Further evidence suggests that people may, in fact, be observing different levels of cooperativeness in others across time and situations; there is considerable disagreement between participants on who are the most generous or moral campmates (Smith & Apicella, 2020). Behavioral persistence is necessary for partner choice to maintain cooperation-without it, a person's current willingness to cooperate provides no information about whether that person will cooperate in the future.…”

The Moralization of Effort

“…There is indeed some evidence that individuals in modern hunter-gatherer societies also moralize hard work (Smith & Apicella, 2019), suggesting that effort moralization may rest on more fundamental, potentially evolutionary origins. In the collaborative, group-living environments in which humans evolved, focusing on displays of costly signaling, like displays of effort, may have been an efficient and adaptive way to assess the cooperative intent of others (Gintis, Smith & Bowles, 2001).…”

Evidence against the "anomalous-is-bad" stereotype in Hadza hunter gatherers

“…We ask about morality and THE ANOMALOUS-IS-BAD BIAS IN HADZA HUNTER GATHERERS 5 foraging ability because some evidence suggest that the stereotype is specific to morality, 5 and foraging ability is an important dimension on which Hadza evaluate campmates. 27,28 Asking about foraging ability thereby allows us to examine the specificity of the stereotype. Finally, we also explore variation within the Hadza as a function of exposure to non-Hadza cultures.…”