Do religious and market-based institutions promote cooperation in Hadza hunter-gatherers?

Humans’ willingness to bear costs benefit others is an evolutionary puzzle. Cultural group selection proposes a possible answer this puzzle—cooperative norms and institutions proliferate due group-level benefits. For instance, belief in knowledgeable, moralizing deities theorized decrease selfishness favoritism through threat of supernatural punishment. Similarly, fairness cooperation are have coevolved with engagement markets, which necessitate anonymous exchanges. We investigate these theories among the Tanzanian Hadza who, until recently, had minimal exposure markets or major world religions. Engagement Western tourists, village Christian missionaries increasingly leading researchers ask how such interactions affected cooperative behavior. interviewed 172 from 15 camps varying market proximity, measured decision-making using economic games. find that associated increased knowledgeable punitive deity, mixed evidence beliefs, turn, affect game play. In contrast, we some those living market-adjacent regions exhibit less in-group when cooperating. These results support claim market-norms, degree religious facilitate greater social interactions.