The Social Brain Hypothesis

University Press Scholarship Online

Oxford Scholarship Online

Lucy to Language: The Benchmark Papers

R. I. M. Dunbar, Clive Gamble, and J. A. J. Gowlett

Print publication date: 2014

Print ISBN-13: 9780199652594
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: March 2015
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:osobl/9780199652594.001.0001

The Social Brain Hypothesis

An Evolutionary Perspective on the Neurobiology of Social
Behaviour1

Susanne Shultz
R.I.M. Dunbar

DOI:10.1093/acprof:osobl/9780199652594.003.0003

This chapter places human cognition into an evolutionary

context by describing brain and cognitive evolution in humans'
closest relatives, the primates (prosimians, monkeys, and
apes), and how human cognition differs from that of other
animals. In particular, it examines ‘social cognition’, the kinds
of cognitive processes that are believed to underlie social
behaviour and social relationships. After reviewing what is
known about social cognition in the brain and what insights
neuroimaging has provided about how humans execute socio-
cognitive tasks, the chapter discusses the contribution that
has been made by the rapid advances in neuroimaging
technology during the last decade or so. Finally, it explores
the main assumptions of the social brain hypothesis, which
attributes the large brains of primates to the cognitive
demands imposed by social complexity.

Keywords: human cognition, brain, evolution, humans, primates, social

cognition, social behaviour, neuroimaging, social brain hypothesis, social
complexity

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PRINTED FROM OXFORD SCHOLARSHIP ONLINE (www.oxfordscholarship.com). (c) Copyright Oxford University Press, 2017. All
Rights Reserved. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a PDF of a single chapter of a
monograph in OSO for personal use (for details see http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/page/privacy-policy). Subscriber:
Hacettepe University; date: 17 January 2017