Using a sample of 80 Austronesian societies from the Ethnographic Atlas, the study applies phylogenetic comparative methods to explore the transmission of cultural traits. The authors follow the research question: "for each possible cultural trait in each society, does the geographical (GNN) or phylogenetic nearest neighbor (PNN) best predict the state of the cultural trait?". Cultural traits in the realms of social organization, kinship, marriage, and subsistence were examined. The results show that PNN predicted slightly more traits in comparison to GNN, but there was not much variation between the different economic and social traits. In addition, 43-48% of traits were not predicted by GNN or PNN.

This exploratory study seeks to explain cassava production and processing in Africa by considering cultural, agronomic, and environmental data. After examining the descriptive results of the agricultural and social contexts of cassava use, the authors build upon Boserup's population density model (1965) to analyze their own hypothesized model of cassava's importance among the sampled societies.

The authors of this study globally test the culture of honor hypothesis, which proposes that societies with traditional herding practices developed value systems that encourage revenge and violence. Because their livelihood depends on a mobile asset, herders are more vulnerable to theft and may be more likely to turn to violence or aggressiveness to defend their animals. The authors found dependence on herding to be significantly associated with both past and contemporary conflict and punishment.

The authors examine correlations between slavery and variables that can potentially be detected archaeologically. The authors do not test specific hypotheses, but aim to explore the variables in a broader sense. As such, the authors use a grounded theory approach to data analysis in order to examine trends that emerge from the data itself.

Research sampled 143 societies from the Standard Cross Cultural Sample to test the relationship between honor culture, social rewards for warriors, and intergroup conflicts. Using mediation analysis based on multiple regression, and structural equation modeling, the research supported the theory that honor culture was positively associated with intergroup conflict, and that this relationship was mediated by social rewards for warriors.

The author evaluates predictions from the standard model of intensification of food production and suggests it be rejected based on an analysis of 40 societies. The standard model proposes that food producers will increase their energy input until the maximum possible output is achieved, at which point output and labor productivity will fall and producers will invent or adopt new technologies. He then proposes a different model, which he terms the cultural niche construction model. The cultural niche construction model proposes that societies will minimize their energy input while maximizing their returns through continual technological adaptation and niche construction. After predictions from this second model are tested, the author suggests tentatively accepting the cultural niche construction model as a new framework to explain transitions to complex societies.

The researchers develop and compare two evolutionary models to evaluate the association between social stratification and female genital modification(FGMo) in a cross-cultural African sample, theorizing that social hierarchy creates competition for high-value males in which FGMo acts as a costly demonstration of paternity certainty. Although the null model outperforms the stratification model when applied to empirical data, an association between FGMo and stratification is found in the expected direction. The authors suggest that while stratification may be an important factor in the de novo origins of FGMo, spread and persistence of the practice subsequently become more heavily dependent on other selective forces.

Genetic, linguistic, and geographic data can be used to explain the distribution of cultural units ("semes") and to understand the evolutionary mechanisms of culture. Three broad models of cultural transmission attempt to explain why cultures share semes: (1) Cultural diffusion, emphasizing horizontal transmission. (2) Local adaptation, where trail-and-error learning leads to the independent adoption of semes by different peoples living in similar environments. (3) Demic diffusion, which emphasizes vertical and frequency-dependent transmission. Authors test the explanatory power of each model using cultural, genetic, linguistic and geographic data from 36 African cultures.

This study asks the following research questions: What are the dynamics of land ownership norms over time? Do these changes follow predetermined trajectories? The authors utilize biogeographical and evolutionary analyses to explore temporal and spatial patterns in land ownership norms within a sample of 73 Bantu societies. For the first component of the research, they test three prominent hypotheses regarding evolutionary trajectories: rectilinear, unilinear, and shift without restriction. For the second component, they use a multi-model inference approach to evaluate three hypotheses regarding the possible spatial patterns of land ownership. The results show evidence for the unilinear trajectory in type, but not with a consistent decrease in group ownership in size. Land ownership is more likely in areas with neighboring landowners and predictable resource productivity, while subsistence type is not significantly correlated with type of land ownership.

This article examines marital residence and sibling coresidence among horticulturalists in the South American lowlands. The authors reject a hypothesis that patrilocality is the defining trait of Amazonian tropical forest culture. Results on horticulturalists are compared with findings on hunter-gatherers: horticulturalists tend to be more uxorilocal. Empirical analysis also suggests that women tend to live with more kin later in life, and in large villages headmen live with more kin than nonheadmen.