Behavioral Drives
Very cool article in Science Magazine (Luke D. Fannin (Dartmouth College), Chalachew Seyoum (University of Arizona), Vivek Venkataraman (University of Calgary), Justin Yeakel (yay Santa Fe Institute!!), Christine Janis (Brown University), Thure Cerling (University of Utah), Nathaniel Dominy (Dartmouth College), Behavior drives morphological change during human evolution, Science389,488-493(2025).DOI:10.1126/science.ado2359).
The authors show in a specific case that a behavioral shift (dietary shift to graminoid plants evidenced through hominin fossil isotopes) preceded a morphological shift (changes in dental morphology) by a few years (700000!), providing supporting evidence for the behavioral drive concept: changes in behavior can "propel the evolution of new morphological traits."
Time will tell whether social media behavior might have a similar impact on brain morphology. In a few years. In the meantime we can still reverse course. Or not. link