Ito (2017) “A Survey for the Methodology of the Theories on Cumulative Cultural Evolution”

Abstract: Why only human-beings acquired complex cultural traits? In this research, we survey the theories on cumulative cultural evolution that has been dealing with this question. This is important because cultural evolution is so interdisciplinary a research field as not able to sufficiently systematize existing methods even though we focused only on cumulative and theoretical aspects. In order for terse classification, preceding researches were arranged according to two criteria chronological and methodological. As a result, the former depicted, as already pointed out by Horiuchi (2012), that the current theoretical approach is largely based on learning hypothesis and population hypothesis. On the other hand, the latter suggested the circumstances where methods are still miscellaneous and arbitrarily set to obtain predetermined conclusions. Therefore, this survey concludes it is necessary for agents’ learning and inheritance process to have the consistent assumptions supported by empirical studies. While there are potential constraints, working on this issue with reference to other disciplines would strongly contribute to the further development of theoretical research on cumulative cultural evolution.

Full article(Github)

Japan Association for Evolutionary Economics the 21th anniversary meeting at Kyoto University, (non-published).

Ito (2016) “Dynamics of Cumulative Culture with Microfoundation”

Abstract: This paper presents a dynamics of cumulative culture by using the methodology of economic growth theory which similarly deals with the accumulation stemming from human activities. Two main results can be derived from the model we set. First, the steady-state value of cultural stock is not affected by its quality and evaluation. Second, the steady-state is almost stable in all transitional dynamics. These imply that only indirect intervention has the real effect on cultural stock which is especially related to acquisition cost, depreciation and creativity.

Full article, Full article (Github)

Journal of Information Studies, Interfaculty Initiative in Information Studies, The University of Tokyo, No.91.