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e. Sociocultural evolution, sociocultural evolutionism or social evolution are theories of sociobiology and cultural evolution that describe how societies and culture change over time. Whereas sociocultural development traces processes that tend to increase the complexity of a society or culture, sociocultural evolution also considers process ...
Unilineal evolution. Unilineal evolution, also referred to as classical social evolution, is a 19th-century social theory about the evolution of societies and cultures. It was composed of many competing theories by various anthropologists and sociologists, who believed that Western culture is the contemporary pinnacle of social evolution.
Multilineal evolution is a 20th-century social theory about the evolution of societies and cultures. It is composed of many competing theories by various sociologists and anthropologists. This theory has replaced the older 19th century set of theories of unilineal evolution, where evolutionists were deeply interested in making generalizations.
Cultural evolution is an evolutionary theory of social change. It follows from the definition of culture as "information capable of affecting individuals' behavior that they acquire from other members of their species through teaching, imitation and other forms of social transmission". [1] Cultural evolution is the change of this information ...
Spencer believed that this evolutionary mechanism is also necessary to explain 'higher' evolution, especially the social development of humanity. Moreover, in contrast to Darwin, he held that evolution has a direction and an end-point, the attainment of a final state of equilibrium. He tried to apply the theory of biological evolution to sociology.
Gerhard Emmanuel " Gerry " Lenski, Jr. (August 13, 1924 – December 7, 2015) was an American sociologist known for contributions to the sociology of religion, social inequality, and introducing the ecological-evolutionary theory. He spent much of his career as a professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he served as ...
Ecological-evolutionary theory (EET) is a sociological theory of sociocultural evolution that attempts to explain the origin and changes of society and culture. [1][2] Key elements focus on the importance of natural environment and technological change. [3] EET has been described as a theory of social stratification, as it analyzes how ...
E. O. Wilson defined sociobiology as "the extension of population biology and evolutionary theory to social organization". [6]Sociobiology is based on the premise that some behaviors (social and individual) are at least partly inherited and can be affected by natural selection. [7]