@article {663596, title = {The evolution of self-control}, journal = {Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences}, volume = {111}, number = {20}, year = {2014}, pages = {E2140-E2148}, abstract = {Cognition presents evolutionary research with one of its greatest challenges. Cognitive evolution has been explained at the proximate level by shifts in absolute and relative brain volume and at the ultimate level by differences in social and dietary complexity. However, no study has integrated the experimental and phylogenetic approach at the scale required to rigorously test these explanations. Instead, previous research has largely relied on various measures of brain size as proxies for cognitive abilities. We experimentally evaluated these major evolutionary explanations by quantitatively comparing the cognitive performance of 567 individuals representing 36 species on two problem-solving tasks measuring self-control. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that absolute brain volume best predicted performance across species and accounted for considerably more variance than brain volume controlling for body mass. This result corroborates recent advances in evolutionary neurobiology and illustrates the cognitive consequences of cortical reorganization through increases in brain volume. Within primates, dietary breadth but not social group size was a strong predictor of species differences in self-control. Our results implicate robust evolutionary relationships between dietary breadth, absolute brain volume, and self-control. These findings provide a significant first step toward quantifying the primate cognitive phenome and explaining the process of cognitive evolution.}, url = {https://www.pnas.org/content/111/20/E2140}, author = {MacLean, EL and Hare, B. and Nunn, C.L. and Addessi, E and Amici, F and Anderson, R.C. and Aureli, F and Baker, J. M. and Bania, AE and Barnard, AM and Boogert, NJ and Brannon, E.M. and Bray, EE and Bray, J and Brent, LJN and Burkart, JM and Call, J. and Cantlon, JF and Cheke, LG and Clayton, NS and Delgado, MM and DiVincenti, LJ and Fujita, K and Herrmann, E. and Hiramatsu, C and Jacobs, LF and Jordan, KE and Laude, JR and Leimgruber, KL and Messer, EJE and Moura, AC de A and Ostojic, L and Picard, A and Platt, M.L. and Plotnik, JM and Range, F and Reader, SM and Reddy, RB and Sandel, AA and Santos, L. R and Schumann, K and Seed, A.M. and Sewall,KB and Shaw, RC and Slocombe, KE and Y. Su and Takimoto, A and Tan, J. and Tao, R and van Schaik, C.P. and Vir{\'a}nyi, Z and Visalberghi, E and Wade, JC and Watanabe, A and Widness, J and Young, JK and Zentall, TR and Zhao, Y.} }