Pan Cultures

The group asks which building blocks of culture are shared across species and which became elaborated in the human lineage. To address this question, Pan Cultures combines comparative cognition, behavioural observation, field-based approaches, and controlled experiments. Its research examines how apes learn from one another, how traditions are maintained within groups, how behaviour varies across populations, and how social and ecological environments shape cultural expression. A central focus is social learning: how young apes acquire knowledge and skills in rich social worlds structured by attention, interaction, and repeated opportunities to observe others. The group also studies population-level behavioural diversity, asking when differences between groups reflect socially transmitted traditions rather than ecology or genetics alone. More broadly, Pan Cultures explores how culture is embedded in cooperation, cognition, and development. By studying the genus Pan, the group contributes to a comparative science of how minds become cultural and helps illuminate both the evolutionary roots of human culture and the distinctive social traditions of other great apes.

Group Leaders

• Edwin van Leeuwen
• Daniel Haun
• Josep Call

Members

• Cyril Defosse,
• L.L. (Lotte) Koot