Research Group Member Profile

Dr Jeremy Kendal

Personal web page

Lecturer in the Department of Anthropology

Telephone: +44 (0) 191 33 41630

Director in the Centre for the Coevolution of Biology and Culture

Co-director, Centre for the Coevolution of Biology and Culture

(email at jeremy.kendal@durham.ac.uk)

Research Interests

Social learning, gene-culture coevolution, cultural evolution and niche construction.

Using experiments, statistical analysis of datasets, computer simulation and mathematical modelling.

Along with collaborators, here are some topics I've been looking at:

Evolution of social transmission biases

Cumulative cultural evolution

Patterns of cultural variation

Cultural evolution of culturally-constructed learning environments

Leadership styles

Norms affecting social dilemmas

Cultural influences on health- and disease-related behaviour.

PhD Opportunities

Contact me by Jan 2013 if you'd like to apply to one of the Durham funding opportunities, listed here, with a PhD proposal in one of the research areas listed above (also see publications below).

A broader list of funding opporunities are listed here.

Research Students

Caroline Walters, PhD student - developing epidemiological models to examine social influences on drug and alcohol-related behaviour (co-supervisor: Brian Straughan, Mathematics Department).

Matt Offord, DBA student - social influences on leadership style (co-supervisor: Roger Gill, Durham Business School).

Erika McClure, PhD student - eating norms in Bangladeshi immigrants (co-supervisor: Gillian Bentley, Anthropology Department).

Ex-students

Katy Eckert, MSc student - Potential influences of proximity and social learning on male mate retention tactics.

Anna Pantazi, MSc student - simulating the cultural evolution of self-medication behaviour.

Teaching

I teach Understanding Behaviour, Evolutionary Theory, Cultural Evolution in addition to various statistics and methods modules.

EHBEA

I am the Early Career Officer for the European Human Behaviour and Evolution Association (EHBEA). EHBEA early career researchers are welcome to contact me with queries or suggestions for development of the society.

A group of us co-organised the 2012 EHBEA conference in Durham.

Curiosities

Early one morning, I wondered what would happen to the Premier League results if points were awarded to aggregate home-and-away scores...here's the answer...

Biography

BSc (Hons) in Biology, University of Nottingham (1997)

MSc in Biological Computation, University of York (1998).

PhD entitled Social Learning: Mechanisms, Functions and Evolutionary Consequences (2003), Sub-Dept. of Animal Behaviour, Dept. of Zoology, University of Cambridge, supervised by Kevin Laland.

Postdoc, Feldman lab, Stanford University (2003-5), developing mathematical models of cultural evolution in humans.

Postdoc, Laland Lab, University of St. Andrews (2005-7), using behaviour experiments and mathematical models to investigate the evolution of social learning strategies.

RCUK Research Fellowship, Durham University (2007-2012).

Lecturer (2012-).

Research Groups

Anthropology in Development
Evolutionary Anthropology
Evolutionary Anthropology Research Group
Medical Anthropology Research Group

Publications

Books: sections

Kendal, J.R. (2013). Gene-culture Coevolution. In Theory in Social and Cultural Anthropology: An Encyclopedia. McGee, J. & Warms, R.
Kendal J.R. (2011). Interactions between cognition and culture. In: Evolutionary Psychology: a critical introduction. Ed. V. Swami. In Evolutionary Psychology: a critical introduction. Viren Swami Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. 311-342.
Laland, K.N., Kendal, J.R. & Kendal, R.L. (2009). Animal culture: problems and solutions. In The Question of Animal Culture. Laland, K.N. & Galef, B.G. Jr. Harvard: Harvard University Press.
Laland, K.N. & Kendal, J.R. (2003). What the models say about animal social learning. In The Biology of Traditions. Fragaszy, D.M. & Perry, S. Chicago University Press. 33-55.

Departmental working papers

Kendal, J.R. , Ihara, Y. & Feldman, M.W. (2005). Cultural niche construction with application to fertility control: a model for education and social transmission of contraceptive use. Morrison Institute Working Paper Series 102.

Journal papers: academic

Flynn E.G., Laland K.N., Kendal R.L. & Kendal J.R. (2013). Developmental niche construction. Developmental Science 16(2): 296-313.
Walters CE, Straughan B & Kendal JR (2013). Modelling alcohol problems: Total recovery. Ricerche di Matematica
Kendal, J.R. (2011). Cultural niche construction and human learning environments: investigating socio-cultural perspectives. Biological Theory 6(3): 241-250.
Kendal J.R., Tehrani J.J. & Odling-Smee J. (2011). Human Niche Construction in Interdisciplinary Focus. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B. Biological Sciences 366(1566): 785-792.
Setchell, J.M., Kendal, J.R. & Tyniec, P. (2010). Do non-human primates synchronise their menstrual cycles? A test in mandrills. Psychoneuroendocrinology
Kendal, R.L., Custance, D., Kendal, J.R., Vale, G. , Stoinski, T. Rakotomalala, N.I. & Rasaminanana, H. (2010). Evidence for social learning in wild lemurs (Lemur catta). Learning and Behavior 38: 220-234.
Pike, T.W., Kendal, J.R., Rendell, L.E. & Laland, K.N. (2010). Learning by proportional observation in a species of fish. Behavioral Ecology 21: 570-575.
Hoppitt, W.J.E., Kandler, A., Kendal J.R. & Laland K.N. (2010). The effect of task structure on diffusion dynamics: Implications for diffusion curve and network-based analyses. Learning and Behavior 38(3): 243-251.
Tanaka, Mark M., Kendal, Jeremy R. & Laland, Kevin N. (2009). From Traditional Medicine to Witchcraft: Why Medical Treatments Are Not Always Efficacious. PLoS ONE 4(4): e5192, 1-9.
Kendal Rachel L., Kendal Jeremy R., Hoppitt Will & Laland Kevin N. (2009). Identifying Social Learning in Animal Populations: A New ‘Option-Bias’ Method. PLoS ONE 4(8): e6541.
Kendal, Jeremy R., Rendell, Luke, Pike, Thomas W. & Laland, Kevin N. (2009). Nine-spined sticklebacks deploy a hill-climbing social learning strategy. Behavioral Ecology 20(2): 238-244.
Kendal, Jeremy R., Giraldeau, Luc-Alain & Laland, Kevin N. (2009). The evolution of social learning rules: Payoff-biased and frequency-dependent biased transmission. Journal of Theoretical Biology 260(2): 210-219.
Laland, K.N., Odling-Smee, J., Feldman, M.W. & Kendal, J.R. (2008). Conceptual Barriers to Progress Within Evolutionary Biology. Foundations of Science
Stanley EL,, Kendal RL,, Kendal JR,, Grounds S, & Laland KN. (2008). Factors affecting the stability of foraging traditions in fishes. Animal Behaviour 75: 565-572.
Kendal, J.R. (2008). Modelling social learning in monkeys. Behavioral Analyst Today
Kendal, J.R., Kendal, R.L. & Laland, K.N. (2007). Erratum to Quantifying and modelling social learning processes in Monkey Populations. ournal of Psychology and Psychological Therapy 8(1).
Kendal JR, , Kendal RL, & Laland KN. (2007). Quantifying and modeling social learning processes in monkey populations. International Journal of Psychology and Psychological Therapy 7(2): 123-138.
Laland, K.N. Kendal, J.R. & Brown, G. (2007). The niche construction perspective: implications for human behaviour. Journal of Evolutionary Psychology 5: 51-66.
Kendal J,, Feldman MW, & Aoki K (2006). Cultural coevolution of norm adoption and enforcement when punishers are rewarded or non-punishers are punished. Theoretical Population Biology 70(1): 10-25.
Borenstein, E, Kendal, J & Feldman, M (2006). Cultural Niche Construction in a metapopulation. Theoretical Population Biology 70(1): 92-104.
Kendal, J.R. (2006). Review of ``Social Learning and Imitation'': Volume 32(1), 2004, of Learning and Behavior. Interaction Studies 7: 273-288.
Day RL,, Coe RL,, Kendal JR, & Laland KN. (2003). Neophilia, innovation and social learning: A study of intergeneric differences in Callitrichid monkeys. Animal Behaviour 65: 559-571.
Reader, S.M. Kendal, J.R. & Laland, K.N. (2003). Social learning through local enhancement in wild guppy fish in Trinidad. Animal Behaviour 66: 729-739.
Swaney, W. Kendal, J.R. , Capon, H. Brown, C. & Laland, K.N. (2001). Familiarity facilitates social learning of foraging behaviour in the guppy. Animal Behaviour 62: 591-598.
Kendal, J.R. & Laland, K.N. (2000). Mathematical models for memetics. Journal of Memetics 4: 0.

Short Works

Kendal J.R. (2012). Comment concerning cumulative cultural evolution, on M. O'Brien and K.N. Laland 'Genes, culture and agriculture: an example of human niche construction'. Current Anthropology 53(4): 434.
Kendal Jeremy R., Tehrani Jamshid J. & Kendal Rachel L. (2009). The Evolution of Human Behaviour.
Rendell, L. Hoppitt, W. & Kendal, JR. (2008). Commentary: Is all learning innovation? Behavioral and Brain Sciences 30(4): 421-422.
Day RL,, Kendal JR, & Laland KN, (2001). Validating cultural transmission in Cetaceans. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 24: 330-331.

Media Contacts

Available for media contact about:

Evolution: Social Learning - examining how animals and humans learn from one another.
Evolution: gene-culture coevolution - examining the interaction between the evolution of genetic traits and cultural traits.
Evolution: niche construction - examining the evolutionary consequences of organisms modifying their environment
Evolution: Cultural evolution - examining the spread of cultural traits.