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What enables human language? A biocultural framework

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To account for human language, we propose a multifaceted and explicitly biocultural framework grounded in empirical investigations spanning a diverse array of empirical and theoretical fields. The framework is illustrated with three facets of language with distinctive evolutionary history, each involving multiple disciplines and several species — e.g., humans, primates, and songbirds. Such case studies highlight the importance of both biological preparedness and cultural processes, as well as the interactions between them, in the emergence of language. The empty gray boxes suggest other facets of language, not discussed, that could be similarly investigated under this framework.

Arnon, Inbal, Liran Carmel, Nicolas Claidière, et al. 2025.
What Enables Human Language? A Biocultural Framework
Science 390 (6775): eadq8303. —  @HAL

Nicolas Claidiere

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Nicolas Claidiere is a CNRS Research Director at CRPN, where he co-leads the development and phylogeny research group (DePhy) and directs the Primate Cognition and Behaviour platform. His research lies at the intersection between psychology, animal behaviour, and evolutionary biology, with a focus on understanding how social behaviour emerges, spreads, and evolves.

Using a comparative approach that brings together human and non-human primates, he investigates the cognitive and social mechanisms that underpin social learning and cultural evolution. A central theme of his work is how information flows within groups, how social networks shape individual and collective behaviour, and how these dynamics give rise to stable traditions or rapid innovation.