Both Diet and Sociality Affect Primate Brain-Size Evolution.

ABSTRACT: Increased brain size in humans and other primates is hypothesized to confer cognitive benefits but brings costs associated with growing and maintaining energetically expensive neural tissue. Previous studies have argued that changes in either diet or levels of sociality led to shifts in brain size, but results were equivocal. Here we test these hypotheses using phylogenetic comparative methods designed to jointly account for and estimate the effects of adaptation and phylogeny. Using the largest current sample of primate brain and body sizes with observation error, complemented by newly compiled diet and sociality data, we show that both diet and sociality have influenced the evolution of brain size. Shifting from simple to more complex levels of sociality resulted in relatively larger bra

SUBMITTER: Grabowski M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10275546 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature