Nonhuman Primate learning: The Importance of learning from an Evolutionary Perspective

Abstract
Learning is adaptive, and throughout their evolutionary history primates have been programmed for ease of learning. Comparative studies of learning are of limited value if they ignore the biological referrent. Primates have a potential for learning broad sets of new tasks. Age, sex, social structure, and kinship relationships affect the learning process. An anthropology of learning must be an anthropology of the evolution of learning. This perspective raises a number of research questions for future investigation. ADAPTATION, CROSS‐SPECIFIC, EVOLUTION, LEARNING, PRIMATES.