Ethnocentrism, the tendency to favor one’s own group, is implicated in a wide variety of important phenomena from voting patterns to ethnic discrimination and armed conflict. Many social scientists believe that ethnocentrism derives from cultural learning and depends on considerable social and cognitive abilities. However, this view is inconsistent with evidence that ethnocentrism is common throughout a diverse range of animal, plant, and single-celled species. Such evidence suggests that ethnocentrism may have a basis in biological evolution and that it requires fairly minimal cognition. The ability to distinguish in- vs. out-group members and select different behaviors based on that distinction may suffice. A recent computer simulation with simple abstract agents … Continue reading Thomas R. Shultz, Max Hartshorn, Artem Kaznatcheev