Adrian Viliami Bell

Image shows the panels of the final Calvin and Hobbes cartoon, published on December 31st 1995, drawn by comic artist Bill Watterson. It depicts Calvin (a young boy) and Hobbes (a stuffed tiger and his close companion) trekking outside in their winter clothes, across a fresh blanket of snow. Calvin: Wow, it really snowed last night! Isn't it wonderful! Hobbes: Everything familiar has disappeared! The world looks brand-new! Calvin: A new year. ... A fresh clean start! Hobbes: It's like having a big white sheet of paper to draw on! Calvin: A day full of possibilities! The two of them board their sled in anticipation. Calvin: It's a magical world, Hobbes ol' buddy... They set off on the sled out into the snow. Calvin: ... Let's go exploring!

30 years ago today, December 31st 1995, the last ever Calvin & Hobbes comic strip was published. Even now, I still find it so poignant & moving.

Uh, Santa is merely an extension of parents trying to get their kids to not be naughty through an all carrots no stick approach

@royalsocietypublishing.org has published an OPEN ACCESS theme issue of Philosophical Transactions B: “Transforming cultural evolution research and its application to global futures” compiled and edited by Adam H Boyette, Sarah Mathew, Stephen Asatsa, Michael Chimento, and Rachel L Kendal 💫

👇 👇 👇

This new issue of #PhilTransB expands the field of cultural #evolution and shows why it matters for today’s biggest challenges. It highlights research funded by the @culturalevolsoc.bsky.social's Transformation Fund, which focused on #DEI: royalsocietypublishing.org/rstb/issue/3...

The deadline has been extended - there is still time to get your abstracts in to join us in Morocco!

Our recently announced ACE Course Design Awards showcased excellent teaching materials from CE courses.

We're now pleased to announce the ACE Teaching Innovation Awards, aimed at those looking to include more CE in their courses. Find out more @ the link below!

vuw.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_...

A photo of the Susan Welch Liberal Arts building at sunrise

📢 Come join us! Penn State Anthropology is hiring *two tenure-track assistant professors*, one in human reproductive ecology and one in archaeology. Here are just a few reasons why working at Penn State is awesome:

YouTube video by Ella Warnick Fatongia | Official Trailer

I'm co-directing an independent film w/ Ella Warnick about marine foraging, environmental adaptation, & family in Tonga, trailer:

youtu.be/3ttrOkX-esU?...

Still not finished! I have a job already, but to finish this film please support my young, up-and-coming co-director:

gofund.me/d9b24a5af

We are delighted to announce that the CES2026 conference website is now live! We invite you to submit your presentation proposals using the link on the webpage, deadline November 16th:
airess.fgses-um6p.ma/ces2026

The count down starts for #CESRabat! Follow @ces2026.bsky.social and join us May 11-13 next year for an exciting meeting in Rabat, Morocco.

Massive thanks to the #CESRabat organising committee:
Sarah Alami (co-chair)
Mathieu Charbonneau (co-chair)
Zachary Garfield
Edmond Seabright

We are pleased to announce our newly elected committee members of the Cultural Evolution Society:

Minhua Yan @minhuayan.bsky.social
Helena Miton @helenamiton.bsky.social
Wataru Toyokawa @watarutoyokawa.bsky.social &
Mason Youngblood @masonyoungblood.bsky.social

Welcome and congratulations!!

@jeremykoster.bsky.social @avbell.bsky.social @drelenamiu.bsky.social @duhe.bsky.social @eapower.bsky.social @kevinlala.bsky.social @charlesefferson.bsky.social

Individual social identities indicate group affiliations and are typically associated with 3 group-typical preferences, signals that indicate group membership, and the propensity to condition actions on the social signals of others, resulting in group-differentiated interaction norms. Past work modeling identity signaling and coordination has typically assumed that individuals belong to one of a discrete set of groups. Yet individuals can simultaneously belong to multiple groups, which may be nested within larger groupings. Here, we introduce the generalized Bach or Stravinsky game, a coordination game with ordered preferences, which allows us to construct a model that captures the overlapping and hierarchical nature of social identity. Our model unifies several prior results into a single framework, including results related to coordination, minority disadvantage, and cross-cultural competence. Our model also allows agents to express complex social identities through multidimensional signaling, which we use to explore a variety of complex group structures. Our consideration of intersectional identities exposes flaws in naive measures of group structure, illustrating how empirical studies may overlook some social identities if they do not consider the behaviors that those identities function to afford.

New preprint w/ Nathan Gabriel & @avbell.bsky.social: The Evolution of Identity Signals for Coordination in Diverse Societies

The model tackles multiple nested/overlapping identities and complex signaling structure. Recovers lots of old results and adds several new ones osf.io/preprints/so...

School of Social Sciences PhD Studentship (Psychology) at Heriot-Watt University Find a School of Social Sciences PhD Studentship (Psychology) on jobs.ac.uk, the top job board in higher education. Click to view more!

🚨 CE PhD opportunity!

@onicatam.bsky.social is looking for PhD applicants interested in projects related to cultural evolution or language evolution for a fully funded scholarships at the School of Social Sciences at Heriot-Watt University

www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DNH532/s...

Cultural Evolution Society Elections 2025: Nomination Form Please use this form to submit your nomination(s) for the Executive Committee's open positions. On this page we will ask you for general details. The next pages allow you to choose the position(s) ...

Nomination form, and more details, here:

docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Applications for the Cultural Evolution ACE Course Design Awards close July 7. Consider applying to gain funding to up the impact of your courses!

It's CES election time! We have FOUR positions that have come up for renewal, so please consider nominating yourself or your colleagues. Nominations close June 20th, with voting from June 30th -July 4th.

Job announcement 🚨: paid fieldwork opportunity with Sanguatsiniq research project! Details in thread ⬇️ Please share!

📢 CES launches Advancing Cultural Evolution (ACE) Course Design Awards! 🎉 $4000 award + global impact for your cultural evolution course materials. Course must be college/grad level with 10+ hrs content.

Application link: vuw.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_... #CulturalEvolution #Education #Grants

1/ 🌟📢 Applications for our MSc in Psychology, Culture & Evolution at @brunelpsy.bsky.social @brunelgradschool.bsky.social are OPEN for 2025/26 🎓 📢

Ever wondered how culture 🌍 and evolution 🧬 shape human behaviour? 🤔 This interdisciplinary program might be for you 🧵

ACE Lab: Applied Cultural Evolution Laboratory culture, evolution, cooperation, and sustainability

Fully-funded PhD position on the cultural evolution of environmental management!

Link evolution, ecology and behavioral science in the ACE Lab timwaring.info Details: forms.gle/gZWK9BpwYfoG...
@culturalevolsoc.bsky.social @alexmesoudi.com @hyperadapthyrax.bsky.social @michael.muthukrishna.com

Thankyou CES exec for taking this courageous stance.

YouTube video by Cultural Evolution Society Transmissions Episode 1 with Dr Cristina Moya

Interested in Cultural Evolution? You should check out @culturalevolsoc.bsky.social's new 'Transmissions' by @ferylbadiani.bsky.social.

First episode has the inimitable @hyperadapthyrax.bsky.social talking about why CE matters, and helps us understand human behavior & culture

CES offers its full support to the Stand Up For Science rallies in the U.S. on March 7 2025.

YouTube video by Cultural Evolution Society Transmissions Episode 1 with Dr Cristina Moya

We are please to release Transmissions Ep 1, featuring Dr Cristina Moya @hyperadapthyrax.bsky.social in conversation with Feryl Badiani @ferylbadiani.bsky.social

Cristina and Feryl chat about Cristina's work in Peru and discuss CE in human and non-human societies:

youtu.be/2otT0PkhPkw?...

🎙 Exciting news! Transmissions Episode 1 features Dr. Cristina Moya.

In this episode, we explore her fieldwork in Peru, and discuss how pilgrimage sites emerge and sustain themselves over time.

It will be out on YouTube this week—Stay tuned for the link!

Upon learning that yesterday would be my last day as a program officer at the National Science Foundation, I shared this parting message with my colleagues. The next few months will be frenetic and stressful for them. Here are some things that you can do to help them with the mission ahead. (1)

Co-sign 👇 excellent talk covering the anti-racist origins of the field of cultural evolution and giving practical advice on how the field can counter scientific racism

Watch lectures from the best researchers. On-demand video platform giving you access to lectures from conferences worldwide.

For those who missed the @culturalevolsoc.bsky.social conference in Durham last September, the recorded talks are now freely available to watch here:

underline.io/events/456/l...

PostDoc Program * Complexity Science Hub Education

For our junior colleagues in the US looking for opportunities, Europe is a great place to do science 🧪 We have a #postdoc call open right now! #complexity

csh.ac.at/education/po...