{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,9,18]],"date-time":"2026-09-18T21:34:40Z","timestamp":1789767280558,"version":"4.0.1"},"reference-count":61,"publisher":"The Royal Society","issue":"1940","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,4]],"date-time":"2025-12-04T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1764806400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"},{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,4]],"date-time":"2025-12-04T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1764806400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/100000925","name":"John Templeton Foundation","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","id":[{"id":"10.13039\/100000925","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":[],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,4]]},"abstract":"<jats:title>Abstract<\/jats:title>\n                  <jats:p>Cumulative cultural evolution, where populations accumulate ever-improving knowledge, technologies and social customs, is arguably a unique feature of human sociality and responsible for our species\u2019 ecological dominance of the planet. However, at the heart of cumulative cultural evolution is a cooperative dilemma. Assuming asocial learning is more costly than social learning, social learners can act as \u2018information free-riders\u2019 by copying innovations from asocial learners without paying the cost. This cost asymmetry will reduce innovation, inhibiting cumulative culture. Innovators might respond by protecting their knowledge and keeping the benefits to themselves\u2014\u2018information hoarding\u2019\u2014but then others cannot build on their discoveries and again cumulative culture is inhibited. Here we formally model information free-riding and information hoarding within a cumulative cultural evolution framework using both analytical and agent-based models. Model 1 identifies the conditions under which information sharing can evolve in the face of information free-riding and hoarding. Models 2\u20134 then show how three mechanisms known to favour cooperation in non-informational contexts\u2014kin selection, partner choice and cultural group selection\u2014can also solve the informational cooperative dilemma and facilitate cumulative cultural evolution, each with distinct signatures potentially detectable in historical, ethnographic and other empirical data.<\/jats:p>\n                  <jats:p>This article is part of the theme issue \u2018Transforming cultural evolution research and its application to global futures\u2019.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1098\/rstb.2024.0258","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,4]],"date-time":"2025-12-04T20:03:03Z","timestamp":1764878583000},"source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":3,"title":["From information free-riding to information sharing: how have humans solved the cooperative dilemma at the heart of cumulative cultural evolution?"],"prefix":"10.1098","volume":"380","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-7740-1625","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Alex","family":"Mesoudi","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"University of Exeter 1 , ,","place":["Penryn, UK"],"department":["Centre for Ecology and Conservation"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-0229-9822","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"\u00c1ngel","family":"Jim\u00e9nez","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"University of Exeter 1 , ,","place":["Penryn, UK"],"department":["Centre for Ecology and Conservation"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-8554-7256","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Keith","family":"Jensen","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"The University of Manchester 2 , ,","place":["Manchester, UK"],"department":["Division of Psychology, Communication and Human Neuroscience"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-6457-0254","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Lei","family":"Chang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"University of Macau 3 , ,","place":["Taipa, Macau"],"department":["Department of Psychology"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"175","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,4]]},"reference":[{"key":"2026030600554541300_R1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","DOI":"10.2307\/j.ctvc77f0d","volume-title":"The secret of our success","author":"Henrich","year":"2015"},{"key":"2026030600554541300_R2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"187","DOI":"10.1002\/evan.20224","article-title":"The emergence of human uniqueness","volume":"18","author":"Hill","year":"2009","journal-title":"Evol. 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