neanderthal jhe 2004

The expert Neandertal mind

Thomas Wynna*, Frederick L. Coolidgeb

aDepartment of Anthropology, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, CO 80933-7150, USAbDepartment of Psychology, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, CO 80933-7150, USA

Received 15 September 2003; accepted 31 January 2004

Abstract

Cognitive neuropsychology, cognitive anthropology, and cognitive archaeology are combined to yield a picture ofNeandertal cognition in which expert performance via long-term working memory is the centerpiece of problem solving.This component of Neandertal cognition appears to have been modern in scope. However, Neandertals’ workingmemory capacity, which is the ability to hold a variety of information in active attention, may not have been as largeas that of modern humans. This characteristic helps us understand features of the archaeological record, such as therarity of innovation, and allows us to make empirically based speculations about Neandertal personality.� 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Neandertal; Long-term working memory; Expert performance; Levallois

Introduction

This article presents an attempt to describesome of the components of Neandertal thinking,cognition, and personality. Our argument isgrounded in established cognitive theory, bothpsychological and anthropological, and supportedby direct archaeological evidence for structuredNeandertal activity, the Levallois reductionstrategy in particular. Our hypothesis is thatNeandertals relied on a form of expert cognitionknown as long-term working memory, that thisability was essentially modern in scope, and that it

formed the centerpiece of Neandertal problemsolving. As a corollary, we further suggest thatmodern human problem solving arose through anenhancement of working memory that enabledinnovative and experimental thinking. We will alsospeculate about Neandertals’ personality charac-teristics based upon the archaeological recordand studies in cognitive psychology and clinicalneuropsychology.

Premises

Our characterization of the Neandertal mindrests on four premises, each of which is argu-able. However, we believe that each is sufficientlyestablished to warrant what follows.

(1) Modern humans replaced Neandertals. Bythis we mean simply that after the arrival of

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +1-719-262-3126; fax: +1-719-262-3146

E-mail addresses: [email protected] (T. Wynn),[email protected] (F.L. Coolidge).

Journal of Human Evolution 46 (2004) 467–487

0047-2484/04/$ - see front matter � 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.doi:10.1016/j.jhevol.2004.01.005

anatomically and behaviorally modern humans inEurope, sometime after 50 Ka, Neandertals dis-appeared as a distinct population. There remainsconsiderable disagreement in paleoanthropologyabout how this replacement occurred, but there isgeneral consensus that the replacement did occur.

(2) It appears necessary to posit a cognitive/neurological difference between Neandertals andmodern humans; superiority of technology orculture cannot alone account for the success ofmodern humans. We derive this premise fromtwo seemingly inconsistent features of the paleo-anthropological record. First, at least in the initialstages of contact (late Mousterian and earlyAurignacian), modern and Neandertal technologywere not dramatically different. Both were basedon stone tools, projectiles, fire, shelter, and so on;there were differences in style to be sure, but noqualitative difference in control of energy (e.g., nouse of animal traction or other external powersource) or efficiency of technology (we maintain,for example, that the significance of prismaticblade technology has long been overstated). More-over, modern and Neandertal foraging were alsosimilar—hunting and gathering, including somespecialized hunting of single species (Marean andAssefa, 1999; Grayson and Delpech, 2002; Steele,2003). Superficially, at least, the two cultures donot appear to have been radically different; theywere both stone-age hunters and gatherers,certainly no more distinct from one another thanthe most different modern cultures. This makesthe second feature of the paleoanthropologicalrecord a true puzzle: despite this overall culturalsimilarity, Neandertals never truly acculturated.Despite direct or indirect contact for thousandsof years (Mellars, 1996), Neandertals never fullyacquired the trappings of modern human culture(or vice versa). Such a pattern of coexistence formillennia without acculturation does not fit easilyinto anthropology’s understanding of culture pro-cess. It suggests that there must have been a morefundamental difference linked to Neandertal andmodern human capacities for culture, in otherwords, a cognitive difference. There have beenmany attempts to characterize this cognitive differ-ence, mostly based on global models of the mind.More recent examples include Mithen’s (Mithen,

1996) argument for lack of cognitive fluidity,Dennett’s (Dennett, 1991) argument for rollingconsciousness, and Donald’s (Donald, 1991)argument for mythic culture.

(3) This cognitive difference cannot have beendramatic. Here we agree with Hayden:

There may certainly have been some changesin mental capacity and composition fromNeandertal to fully modern human forms (cor-responding to many excavators’ intuitive feelingthat there is “something” intangibly differentabout Neandertal behavior). However, at thelevel of biological capacities, these appear to bevery subtle; neither the relative change in brainsize nor morphology indicates that this was avery significant change.. Neandertals maynot have been quite capable of doing nuclearphysics or calculus; however, it is a travesty ofthe available data to argue that they did nothave the full complement of basic humanfaculties or act in recognizably modern fashions(Hayden, 1993: 137).

Neandertals did compete on a par with ana-tomically modern humans for thousands of yearsand may even have out-competed them for severalmillennia in the Levant (Arsuaga, 2001; Shea,2003). Had they possessed a dramatically lesspowerful intelligence, this situation is unlikely tohave occurred. Comparisons of Neandertal andmodern behavior have tended either to over-emphasize the differences (Binford, 1981) or over-emphasize the similarities (d’Errico et al., 1998). Amore appropriate solution is to posit a smallcognitive difference that had profound long-termconsequences.

(4) Much modern thinking is still based onabilities that evolved long ago. It is very unlikelythat the advent of modern humans was marked bya total reorganization of the brain; it is probablethat much of modern thinking still consists ofprocesses that evolved in earlier times. Manymodern human activities place minimal demandson problem solving ability (the overworkeddriving-to-work example). More likely, the neuralchange leading to modernity was modest andadded to the abilities already possessed by pre-modern populations [e.g., Homo helmei in Africa

T. Wynn, F. Coolidge / Journal of Human Evolution 46 (2004) 467–487468

(McBrearty and Brooks, 2000) and Neandertals inEurope and western Asia]. If we can identify andpeel away this final acquisition, we should be ableto describe the Neandertal mind itself.

Methods

Because we do not have experimental access toNeandertals we must draw on several indirectmethods of enquiry.

1. Cognitive neuropsychology, in particular,studies of working memory and skilled cog-nition. This approach is based primarily onclassic controlled experimental scenarios inwhich the targeted activities are narrowlydefined, subjects tested in controlled settings,and rigorous quantitative measures applied.The subjects in these experiments either havedocumented brain dysfunction or damage, ormay be normal and used to establish a clearreference population. Precise physiologicalassessment with neuroimaging techniques,such as positron emission tomography (PET)and functional magnetic resonance imaging(fMRI) has recently aided greatly in theneuronal localization of many neuropsycho-logical functions and other behaviors.

2. Cognitive anthropology, in particular, studiesof the cognitive basis of technological activity.Cognitive anthropology differs from cognitivepsychology in its emphasis on “real world”activities, and its use of participant observationand ethnographic description. Despite meth-odological differences, cognitive psychologyand cognitive anthropology are not incompat-ible, and in fact together provide a powerfulapproach to understanding the human mind.

3. Cognitive archaeology, in particular the analy-sis of stone tool manufacture using insightsderived from (1) and (2). Cognitive archae-ology, as it is most successfully practiced, is aform of processual archaeology (Nowell, 2001;Wynn, 2002) that relies on cognitive theoriesto interpret action sequences reconstructedfrom the archaeological record itself and fromexperimental replication.

The final piece that made minds modern

In our recent work (Coolidge and Wynn, 2001;Wynn and Coolidge, 2003; Coolidge and Wynn, inpress), we have proffered the following scenarioas the final neuronal rearrangement that led tomodern thinking. This scenario is based onBaddeley and Hitch’s (1974) original concept ofworking memory. As conceived of by Baddeleyand Hitch, and recently modified by Baddeley andLogie (1999) and Baddeley (2001), workingmemory is a tripartite cognitive system consistingof a central executive, primarily involved in main-taining relevant attention and decision-making(the latter two processes are part of the executivefunctions of the frontal lobes), and two slavesystems, phonological storage or articulatory loopfor the maintenance of speech-based informationand the visuospatial sketchpad, an interface forvisual and spatial information. We offered evi-dence from behavioral genetics for the highlyheritable basis of the executive functions of work-ing memory and its slave systems and hypothesizedthat a relatively simple mutation in this systemmay have produced fully modern thinking. Wefurther postulated that this mutation was eitherspecific to phonological storage, and resulted in alengthened capacity to maintain speech sounds, orwas more generic and resulted in an enhancementof the general capacity of the central executive.The latter might have included a greater ability tomaintain attention despite competing but non-relevant stimuli. Because working memory hasbeen empirically shown to be strongly related toboth general intelligence (Kyllonen, 1996) andnative, fluid intelligence (Kane and Engle, 2002),this mutation might have subsequently had a pro-found positive effect on the general reasoningabilities of modern humans. We have labeled thiseffect “enhanced working memory” (EWM). Wealso reviewed archaeological evidence that sup-ports a relatively recent date for such a mutation.Even if it yielded only a slight selective advantage,such a mutation could have spread rapidly inAfrican populations, enabling the dramaticspread of anatomically and behaviorally modernhumans after 50 Ka. There are at least twopossible scenarios (Wynn and Coolidge, 2003). In

T. Wynn, F. Coolidge / Journal of Human Evolution 46 (2004) 467–487 469

the first, this mutation accompanied the evolutionof anatomically modern humans sometime prior to150 Ka in Africa, where it then enabled thegradual development of modern behavior [ascenario favored by, for example, McBrearty andBrooks (2000)]. In the second, the mutationoccurred after 100 Ka and produced behavioralmodernity in groups that were already anatomi-cally modern. This scenario is favored by Kleinand others (e.g., Mithen, 1996; Klein and Edgar,2002; Klein, 2003). In either case, modern humanswith enhanced working memory entered Europesometime after 50 Ka, leading to the eventualdemise of Neandertals (see Table 1 for definitionsof terms associated with working memory).

The expert Neandertal mind

Long-term working memory

Paradoxically, perhaps, one of the abilities thatremain relatively intact when EWM capacity isremoved is skilled, expert knowledge. One of

the most famous neuropsychological case studiesinvolved a patient known as H.M. After a bilateralhippocampectomy (which essentially severed hisability to store any verbal long-term memories,leaving his procedural memory system intact),H.M. could “recall” old procedural skills andtransfer new ones to long-term proceduralmemory, but he could not verbally recall doing so(Milner et al., 1968). Experts are able to access andalso encode information very rapidly, but only inthe narrow domain of their expertise. To explainthis ability, Ericsson and colleagues developed theconcept of long-term working memory (henceforthL-TWM) (Ericsson and Kintsch, 1995). One of thecharacteristics of classic working memory is rapidfade: unless actively maintained by repetition(rehearsal), information held in working memoryfades very rapidly, and is lost in a matter ofseconds. If an experimental subject is distractedwhile performing a WM task, she cannot pick upwhere she left off because the information isgone. But Ericsson (Ericsson and Kintsch, 1995;Ericsson and Delaney, 1999; Ericsson et al., 2000)

Table 1Definitions of working memory terminology

Working memory refers to Baddeley’s model of cognition containing three major components: (1) a decision-making centralexecutive, and two slaves systems; (2) the phonological loop; and (3) the visuospatial sketchpad.

Central executive is the decision-making component of working memory, the chief functions of which are attention to task,selective inhibition, and goal-direction.

Phonological loop consists of two components: (1) a short-term store for verbal and acoustic stimuli (hence the name“phonological store”) and (2) an articulatory (vocal or subvocal) rehearsal mechanism, which allows for the transfer to long-termmemory by way of the hippocampus.

Visuospatial sketchpad is a temporary place of storage for the interface between visual and spatial information and allows for itsmanipulation and long-term storage. It is important for problems of spatial location and orientation.

Long-term working memory is a long-term storage that does not fade rapidly and generally takes more trials to establish than forverbal or declarative memories. It consists of skills (which we have labeled savoir faire) or the ability to replay motor behaviors,techniques, or procedures (hence the name “procedural memory”) such as stone tool knapping. It also includes the declarativeknowledge of those skills (which we labeled connaissance).

Enhanced working memory: we have postulated that the working memory of modern Homo sapiens was enhanced by a mutationapproximately 50 to 100 Ka. Thus, Neanderthals possessed working memory but it did not have the same capacity of modernhumans.

Working memory capacity is a general ability or domain-free capability to control attention and maintain relevant stimuli in theface of interference. It can be enhanced by any increases in capacity by its domain-specific components.


found this not to be true for experts processinginformation in the areas of their expertise. Chessmasters, for example, are able to assess a chessposition very rapidly and, when the position isremoved from view, can return it to mind withvirtually no loss of information, even when dis-tracted. Musicians often demonstrate similar abili-ties, as in the famous example of Mozart learninga complete motet on one hearing (Gutman, 1999).This ability is domain-specific; it is not a generalmemory ability, but a very specialized abilitylinked to the information of one area of expertise.Because it does not fade, the information mustsomehow be entered rapidly into long-termmemory, a process that usually takes many rep-etitions, or a longer time in attention (about 10seconds) than short-term memory. Most long-termmemory is also less reliable than short-termmemory, yet the reliability of expert memory rivalsthat of short-term memory. Here, then, is a formof memory that is fast, reliable, and does not fade,but is very narrowly focused. It is clearly animportant cognitive process for everyday activityand, indeed, appears to underpin our mostimpressive feats of cognitive power.

Ericsson and colleagues have proposed a modelfor L-TWM that can account for an expert’sability to encode information into, and retrieveinformation from, LTM very rapidly. The model isbased on retrieval cues and retrieval structures. Acue is an item of knowledge (a “chunk” in memoryterms) that is linked by association to a longerencoding [Ericsson suggests that the cue “rein-states the conditions of encoding” (Ericsson andKintsch, 1995)]. A retrieval structure is a set ofretrieval cues that the expert creates over time andwhich is relatively stable. Using chess as anexample, when a chess master sees a chess position,his or her chess retrieval structure rapidly encodesthe positions into LTM using retrieval cues(for example, the cue “Sicilian defense” allowsimmediate encoding of the relative position ofthirty two pieces); he or she does not need toencode the specific board location of each piece.Later, if the board is removed, or if it is a blindchess demonstration, the master accesses theencoded information using the same cues (forexample, “Game #2 is Sicilian defense”). The key

element here is the retrieval structure, but expertretrieval structures are not easily acquired. Oneacquires them through extensive practice andanalysis. Ericsson, following the literature onskilled knowledge, suggests that ten years is a goodestimate of the time necessary to achieve mastery-level expertise in fields like chess or music (Mozartwas fourteen at the time he copied the motet andhad been composing since he was four). Theresulting retrieval structure can assess a huge rangeof situations very rapidly because of the breadth itsretrieval cues. The result is, somewhat counter-intuitively, a powerful and flexible kind of think-ing. But it is limited to a narrow domain. Theretrieval structure of a chess master is useless inplaying Go, or even checkers, and indeed is onlyslightly better than average at remembering chessboards on which pieces have been placed ran-domly. L-TWM is not inherently innovative; it canrapidly assess and respond to a huge range offamiliar situations and problems, but is not adeptat creating truly novel responses because theretrieval structure and cues are stable, linkedelements of long-term memory itself.

Neuroimaging studies appear to corroborateEricsson’s model. In fMRI studies of chess playingand Go playing, Atherton et al. (2003a,b) foundthat the areas of cortex normally activated inworking memory, the dorsolateral prefrontal cor-tex in particular, are minimally activated (though,interestingly, more for Go than for chess). Instead,a more diffuse activation pattern is present, as onewould expect from activation of long-termmemory.

While Ericsson emphasizes the performance ofexperts, this kind of thinking is not confined to afew accomplished individuals. It is a style of think-ing employed by everyone in their own areas ofexperience and expertise; it is simply most easilyrecognized and studied in exceptional individuals.Ericsson’s model of L-TWM is, in fact, very simi-lar to accounts of technical thinking provided bycognitive anthropologists. Even though Ericssonemphasizes the role of semantic cues in L-TWM,there is no reason that cues cannot also be images,or even “muscle memories,” which are relativelyprecise patterns of muscle action learned bymultiple repetition that can be deployed without


conscious direction (e.g., a fencing parry). This isespecially clear from a characterization of black-smithing provided by Keller and Keller (1996).

Technical cognition

The most important similarity betweenEricsson’s model of L-TWM and technical cog-nition lies at the behavioral level. The technicalexpert learns his or her craft in the same way thatall experts learn—by observation, analysis, andpractice. The ten-year term cited by Ericsson as anorm for acquiring expert knowledge is essentiallythe same as is necessary to develop from appren-tice to master in any craft. Superficially, at least, allexpertise appears to share this learning curve. Butdo craft experts rely on retrieval cues and retrievalstructures? This is a harder question to answerand requires comparison of two rather differentapproaches to cognition—the experimentallybased studies of cognitive psychology and theethnographic and participant-based studies of cog-nitive anthropology. The experimental approach isgood at isolating and investigating specific cog-nitive components and producing replicableresults. The ethnographic approach is good atdescribing the richness and complexity of real-world tasks. The methods are different but, as wehope to show, the results are comparable.

The Kellers’ (Keller and Keller, 1996) study ofblacksmithing emphasizes a phenomenological/action theory approach to understanding cog-nition, and the clarity of its presentation allowsreinterpretation in light of some of the narrowerconcepts of cognitive psychology. In characterizingthe cognitive life-world of the smith, the Kellersintroduce three useful concepts—stock of knowl-edge, umbrella plan, and constellation. The stockof knowledge consists of the pool of informationacquired by the smith during years of practice.Although it includes semantic information, it con-sists primarily of visual, tactile, and aural imagesof results, materials, and procedures. When asmith begins a task he or she first conceives anumbrella plan, which is “. the smith’s mentalrepresentation of an ultimate goal for productionand his associated general overview of the step-by-step procedures required to attain an end” (Keller

and Keller, 1996: 90). This umbrella plan maycontain semantic knowledge-names of materials,estimates of time, costs, etc., but it is also made upof visual, tactile, and aural images. The plan isexecuted using constellations, which are “. con-figurations of ideas implements, and materials .”(Keller and Keller, 1996: p. 91), that enable thecompletion of one step in the process. A constel-lation is not simply a mental image; it includes,and indeed is constituted through, the actual toolsand materials. The visual, kinesthetic, and auralfeatures of the tools and materials structure thenature of each particular step in a procedure asmuch as any semantically declarative knowledge.There is active feedback between the actions of thesmith and his or her constellation until the step iscompleted or, if it fails, is begun anew with arevised constellation. In common procedures,these constellations may become recipes that aredeployed with little active reflection, though themutually constituting roles of tools, materials, andprocedures still operate.

Even with this superficial presentation of theKellers’ account, it is possible to identify simi-larities with Ericsson’s account of expert perform-ance. First, the stock of knowledge is clearlycontent held in LTM. Much of this knowledgeconsists of procedural memories as well asdeclarative knowledge. It is much richer in contentthan the narrow domains usually tapped in exper-imental studies of LTM, especially in the import-ance of non-semantic information in the guise ofvisual and kinesthetic images, but there is noreason to suppose that it is stored differently.Umbrella plans would appear to be constructedusing retrieval structures. The task at hand calls upthe appropriate retrieval structure, held in LTM,which contains retrieval cues that tap into associ-ated knowledge. What is different about anumbrella plan is that the retrieval structureincludes many non-semantic cues. Constellationsare retrieval structures linked dynamically to toolsand materials. Here the two-way role of retrievalstructures is apparent. Not only do the cues accessappropriate images and procedures, they enablerapid encoding of new information in LTM, add-ing to the smith’s stock knowledge. Short-termworking memory is also engaged in constellations.


A constellation deployed by L-TWM does notexhaust the attention capacity of working memory,especially during routine tasks that have becomerecipes. The free attention capacity can be used toinnovate, plan ahead, or, more dangerously, day-dream. The retrieval cues themselves often consistof image associations: “A glance at a tool maytrigger an idea for production” (Keller and Keller,1996: 94). Such non-semantic retrieval cues areessential elements of all technical activity, but areno different than the semantic cues emphasized byEricsson (indeed, we suspect that many of the cuesused by chess masters may also be visual images).

Ericsson and colleagues have stressed the studyof experts because extraordinary performanceboth calls out for understanding and, because ofthe saliency of expert activity, permits ease ofstudy. But clearly L-TWM is not a cognitionpossessed only by an accomplished few. As thework of the Kellers exemplifies, it is a style ofthinking that is deployed in many human activi-ties; indeed, we contend that it is the style ofthinking that is most commonly used in everydaytasks. That some have achieved mastery levels ofskill reflects the years of concentrated practicenecessary to acquire a stock of knowledge, includ-ing an array of relevant retrieval structures forsuccessful completion of a huge array of potentialtasks.

We believe that Neandertals regularly employedL-TWM that was as effective as any documentedfor modern humans. The evidence lies in thearchaeological record, primarily in the reconstruc-tion of skilled performance in lithic reductionprocedures.

Levallois reduction

Over the last twenty years palaeolithic archae-ologists have moved away from an emphasis onstone tool typologies, which focuses on tools asproducts, to an emphasis on the entire use-lifeof stone artifacts—from initial raw materialacquisition and distribution to discard. MiddlePalaeolithic (MP) assemblages have played per-haps the key role in this reorientation, withDibble’s critique of typology and demonstrationsof MP reduction sequences (Dibble, 1987), and

Boeda’s (Boeda, 1994) reconceptualization ofLevallois being landmark contributions. Thisreorientation is based largely on two methods. Thefirst documents sequences through careful analysisof artifacts, cores, debitage, and experimentalreplication (Boeda, 1994, 1995; Chazan, 1997).The second documents sequences through refittingcores (Van Peer, 1992, 1995; Schlanger, 1996;Chazan, 1997). The two approaches have suc-ceeded in providing a detailed description ofsequences of action required in the production ofMP artifacts. These descriptions are sufficientlydetailed and comprehensive to stand in place ofprehistoric actors in a cognitive analysis. To put itanother way, it is very unlikely that prehistoricknappers used sequences of action that have notbeen identified.

Levallois is the most informative of the MPreduction techniques. We do not, of course, intendto equate Levallois with Neandertals. Its firstappearance in the archaeological record, forexample, antedates the appearance of Neandertals.Moreover, comparable reduction techniques wereused by anatomically modern humans in Africaand the Near East. However, Neandertals did useLevallois and its variants for thousands of years,and it remains the best described example ofsequentially organized action in the Neandertalrecord.

Levallois is a technical process or reductionprocedure, not a tool type (Van Peer, 1992; Boeda,1995; Chazan, 1997). It is a general procedure inwhich a core is prepared for the ultimate removalof one or several flake blanks, which then may ormay not be further modified. The procedure pro-duces a variety of preparatory, intermediate,and final products that document a complexsequence of actions. “The repetitive pattern ofLevallois surface preparation evidences a desire forstandardized morphological control of a limitednumber of blanks” (Van Peer, 1995: 4). Theseblanks are “determined” in the sense that asequence of actions, the chaine operatoire, con-strains the final product. It is not, however, necess-ary that the knapper have an image, a “mentaltemplate,” of the final blank (Schlanger, 1996;Chazan, 1997). In general, there are three basicsteps in the procedure. The first prepares a core


with two distinct but related surfaces, one, a moreconvex platform surface that will include the strik-ing platform, and a second flatter productionsurface from which the blank or blanks will beremoved. The second step prepares the strikingplatform itself in relation to the axis of theintended blank. The third step is the removal, byhard hammer, of the blank or blanks. The first twosteps each encompasses its own sequence of action,as does the final step if multiple blanks areremoved. Levallois is not a single, invariantprocedure. There are two basic varieties—“preferential” for the removal of a single finalblank and “recurrent” for the removal of twoor more final blanks (Boeda, 1995). RecurrentLevallois itself has many variants—unidirectional,bi-directional, and even centripetal (Chazan,1997), and each requires a different approach tocore and platform preparation. “The crucial point,which has been demonstrated repeatedly throughexperimentation, is that the configuration of thetwo faces must suit the specific recurrent methodemployed” (Chazan, 1997: 726). Cores can be, andwere, reused by preparing the platform and pro-duction faces anew, and striking off a secondblank, or second set of blanks. This invariablyrequires an adjustment of technique because themass of the core has been much reduced.

The complexity of the task, and the compre-hensiveness of the accounts, invites a cognitiveinterpretation. In a sense, some archaeologistshave already taken this approach in describing twomajor components of the knapper’s mind:connaissance, which is the knowledge held by theknapper, and savoir faire, which is the motor skillrequired for performance (Boeda, 1995; Chazan,1997). It is also possible to articulate the accountsof Levallois with cognitive anthropology and cog-nitive psychology. The Kellers’ concepts of stockof knowledge, umbrella plan, and constellationcan be directly applied.

The sequence of actions that can be recon-structed for Levallois reduction resembles thesequence of action documented by the Kellers forblacksmithing: a sequential task with definablesteps during which the artisan makes choicesamong a variety of specific techniques and pro-cedures in order to complete each step and,

ultimately, produce a finished product. At thispurely descriptive, qualitative level of comparison,there is no obvious distinction between the twoactivities, especially if we compare Levallois reduc-tion to the “recipe” procedures of blacksmithing(procedures used in often-performed tasks). Butare the cognitive underpinnings the same, that is,did Neandertal stone knappers have stocks ofknowledge, make umbrella plans, and use constel-lations? We can only answer these questions byusing modern knappers as surrogates. Giventhe descriptive similarity between Levallois andmodern technical activity this strikes us justifiable,if not ideal. We have already seen that a technicalanalysis of Levallois, based on experimental knap-ping and refitting, identifies two components tocognition, connaissance and savoir faire. Both areclearly components of the knapper’s stock ofknowledge, with former being the declarative-component and the latter being the skilled pro-cedural and motor component. Equally clearly,both are acquired through extended periods ofpractice. It is apparent that much of this knowl-edge must be held in the form of visual, tactile, andeven aural images concerning raw material, knap-ping qualities, edge angles, angles and force ofdelivery, and so on. Most palaeolithic archae-ologists, for example, understand at least some ofthe declarative knowledge necessary to producea Levallois flake, but very few are capable ofactually doing it because they lack the necessarynon-declarative knowledge and skill. The con-naissance and savoir faire of Levallois knappersclearly constitutes a stock of knowledge that oneacquires with years of practice. This stock ofknowledge includes a large range of alternativeprocedures—recurrent bi-directional, preferential,etc.

Experimental archaeologists and refitters havenot explicitly identified cognitive componentsdirectly comparable to umbrella plans and constel-lations, but their accounts suggest that these inter-pretive concepts are appropriate. Boeda (1995: 46),for example, refers to the “volumetric conceptionof the core” in the guise of “two assymetrical[sic] convex secant surfaces.” Baumler (1995)distinguishes between strategy and sequence.“Reduction strategy refers to the goal(s) of the


knapper, while sequence or sequences morenarrowly represent the method of achieving goals”(p. 17), and “. From beginning to end, thereduction of a core is characterized by adjustmentsto changing parameters—some predictable, othersless so, and some not at all” (p. 17). The awkward-ness of the wording attests to the non-semanticnature of this conception. This visual image wouldappear to orient each step of the process; it is, inessence, the key feature to an umbrella plan devel-oped by the knapper prior to beginning each step.The analog to constellations lies in the actualexecution, which incorporates raw material, avail-able hammers, muscle tensions, visual and auralimages, and the feedback from the process itself. Insum, Levallois reduction, at least as performed bymodern knappers, fits easily into the Kellers’model of technical cognition. More importantly,there is no valid reason to believe that Neandertalsperformed Levallois reduction differently; in otherwords, their technical cognition appears to havebeen the same as that of modern humans.

Levallois reduction also fits the criteria forexpert performance and results from the deploy-ment of Ericsson’s L-TWM. The connaissance andsavoir faire of knappers are clearly informationstored in long term memory. That much of thisinformation is non-semantic simply corroboratesthe importance of visual, tactile, and aural imageryin technical expertise. That modern archaeologicalstudies do not identify a specific cognitive structureor style that can be equated with retrieval cues andretrieval structures is not a surprise. Ericsson’sresearch and that of Boeda and van Peer do notoverlap in terms of specific theory, concepts, orcitation universe. There are, nevertheless, goodreasons for concluding that Levallois reductionemployed retrieval cues and retrieval structures.First, one learns knapping in the same manner asone learns every task—by experience and analysis.Levallois is one of the more difficult techniques tolearn, and mastery emerges only after years ofpractice. From Ericsson’s perspective, a knappermust acquire a large suite of retrieval cues organ-ized into retrieval structures appropriate to a hugevariety of specific circumstances (raw material,nodule shape and size, imperfections, results ofpreforming, results of face preparation and plat-

form preparation, re-preparation, and so on).Second, the dynamic nature of Levallois reductionsuggests not just constellations, but the retrievalstructures on which they are based. Modern knap-pers change their strategy based on changing con-ditions, and it is clear that prehistoric knappers didas well. “The data presented here, based on thecomplete sample of cores and the entire series ofboth Levallois and non-Levallois flakes, clearlyindicate that flaking patterns did indeed changeas a function of the degree of core reduction”(Dibble, 1995: 102). More specifically, we suggestthat the “volumetric conception of the core,” asdescribed by Boeda and Chazan, is itself a retrievalstructure. It consists of an interrelated set of cuesthat call up much larger encodings of the Levalloisprocedure that are held in long term memory. Thecues include the various convexities of the plat-form and production surfaces, edge angle at thestriking platform, orientation of ridges that directthe force, and so on. The larger encodings held inlong term memory include a huge array of infor-mation learned in previous knapping episodes (andencoded through the retrieval structure), some ofwhich is declarative knowledge, but most of whichconsist of images (visual, tactile, and aural), motorprocedures and the muscle tensions tied to skilledactivity.

The validity of applying L-TWM retrievalstructures to prehistoric examples of Levallois iscorroborated by Schlanger’s (1996) masterfulanalysis of a refitted core from Maastricht–Belvedere (a MP site in the Netherlands dating toOIS 7). In reducing the core, the knapper producednine Levallois flakes in seven distinct phases.Toward the beginning of each phase the knapperidentified a particular configuration of the pro-duction surface to act as the distal convexity(opposite the future striking platform), and thentrimmed the lateral convexities and the platformitself. In three of the phases he or she employeda “preferential” strategy, and in three other, a“recurrent” strategy. For each phase he or she hadto modify the plan to adjust to the ever shrinkingsize of the core. This account fits nicely into theKellers’ concepts of umbrella plan, in this casethe overall approach to the core, and constella-tions, in the execution of each phase. Flexibility is


apparent in the ease of shifting from preferential torecurrent and back again. But most telling of all,the knapper clearly used the “distal convexity”as a cue to call up an appropriate retrieval struc-ture that was then used to guide subsequent prep-arations of the core. As we saw with blacksmith-ing, this reliance on the retrieval structures of longterm working memory is characteristic of expertperformance. From this perspective Neandertalexpert technical cognition is indistinguishable fromthat of modern humans.

This account of Neandertal expert cognitionbears on, but certainly does not resolve, severallong standing problems in MP research. It addsmost usefully to our understanding of variabilityand innovation. It has long been recognized thatEuropean MP assemblages varied in terms ofrelative percentages of individual artifact types,relative predominance of knapping techniques,and in the presence and absence of certaindiagnostic types (e.g., handaxes or backed pieces).The degree of variability within the EuropeanMP appears to have been greater than thatrecognized for earlier periods, but not as greatas that recognized for the late Upper Palaeolithic[the apparently intrusive early Upper PalaeolithicAurignacian was, initially at least, less variablethan the local Middle Palaeolithic (Kozlowski2000)]. Archaeologists have interpreted this varia-bility in a variety of ways: Bordes (1968) arguedfor ethnic differences, Binford (1973) for func-tional differences, Mellars (1969, 1973) for chrono-logical differences, and Dibble (1987) fordifferences in reduction sequences, resharpening,and the use-life of tools. Our current account ofexpert cognition fits best into recent interpret-ations by Mellars (1996) and Gamble (1999).Mellars argues that most of MP variability canbe understood as resulting from relative socialisolation and technological drift. This is preciselywhat one would expect of a technology basedentirely on expertise. Because knapping retrievalstructures are stable but flexible strategies of pro-duction, they can adjust to changing circumstancessuch as availability of raw material (size, quality,ease of access) or the demands of specific tasks(butchering freshly killed bison as opposed toscraping reindeer hides). Simple deployment of the

L-TWM stocks of knowledge in varying circum-stances would yield varying products. Moreover,expert retrieval structures take time tolearn—years, in fact—providing ample oppor-tunity for minor intergenerational drift in tech-niques. Major changes would be rare, and occuronly through serendipitous discovery (e.g., a majorblunder with a fortuitously good result) or thearrival of new technologies that could be copied(see below). L-TWM is also consonant withGamble’s (1999) more audacious argumentthat Neandertals acted in “landscapes of habit.”According to Gamble (1999), a Neandertal livedout his or her life on a geographic scale with aradius of perhaps only 20–30 km, with occasionalventures of longer distance. “Within the regionalscale represented here by the landscape of habitand measured by raw-material transfers, the effec-tive networks of individuals structure the degree towhich social life was extended [i.e., no large scalesocial groups]. I therefore conclude that life wasstill very local and usually immediate” (p. 242).Such a scale could easily be organized andexploited through retrieval structures built on veryspecific cues in the local environment. Neandertalswould truly have been experts of their localdomain, so much so that new arrivals would behard pressed to compete. But Neandertals wouldhave had a more difficult time coping with large,interregional spaces, and would be seriously handi-capped for any task requiring long range planning(spatially and temporally).

A technology based solely on L-TWM wouldnot be innovative, if by innovative we mean exper-imentation with new forms and techniques. Thequestion of creativity is a contentious one indiscussions of human evolution, but here weside with Mithen (1996, 1998). Even thoughNeandertals’ technology did vary and change, itdid so on a scale and at a rate that would appear torule out conscious experimentation and creativity.These are, we contend, the stuff of enhancedworking memory. The reason Keller’s blacksmith-ing is not identical to Neandertal knapping isthat EWM provides freed-up attention capacity.Especially when L-TWM has converted umbrellaplans to recipes, the smith has processing capacityavailable to make unique comparisons, think


further ahead, or daydream. One result of this isinnovation. We have no reason to conclude thatNeandertals ever did this. L-TWM worked well forthem and provided sufficient flexibility to solve allof their immediate problems. But their day-to-daylife consisted of recipes and an endless “drive towork.”

Our discussion has focused on Neandertalsbecause they are known to have used the Levalloistechnique, and are otherwise the best known pre-modern hominid. They were certainly not alone indemonstrating reliance on expert performance.Other late Pleistocene hominids used Levallois andother prepared core techniques of equal com-plexity. Our characterization of Neandertal cog-nition applies to these hominids as well. Onegroup of these, perhaps McBrearty and Brooks’(McBrearty and Brooks, 2000) Homo helmei,eventually gave rise to anatomically and behav-iorally modern humans with enhanced workingmemory.

Neuropsychology

There is some interesting evidence from neuro-psychological studies of normally functioningadults who have naturally restricted work-ing memory that corroborates this picture ofNeandertal cognition. Kane and Engle (2002) haveinvestigated the role of the prefrontal cortex inworking memory, its executive functions, and theirrelationship to intelligence from an individual-differences perspective. They first established,through numerous empirical studies of evidence,the important role that the prefrontal cortex playsin both working memory and executive functions,especially their overlapping roles in attention torelevant tasks. They view this focused attentionas a central feature of the prefrontal cortex andnote that a critical aspect is the maintenance ofattention in spite of competing but irrelevantstimuli. Interestingly, as previously noted, workingmemory capacity has been shown to be stronglycorrelated to both general intelligence and fluidintelligence (e.g., Kyllonen, 1996; Kane and Engle,2002). Kane and Engle also argue that typicalshort-term memory tasks (verbal memory oflists of words) are not correlated as well with

intelligence and working memory capacity becausethese tasks do not generally employ distraction.They postulate that maintenance of attention inthe presence of interference is the critical controlfunction of working memory capacity. Kane andEngle used various working memory tasks onnormally functioning participants and dividedthem into two extreme groups, those with thehighest working memory spans and those with thelowest working memory spans. They found thatthat the lowest span participants were more sus-ceptible to long-term memory interference, includ-ing retroactive and proactive interference. IfNeandertals did have restricted working memorycapacities, then they would have had greater diffi-culty in solving a new task because of prior habitsof thought. Kane and Engle have also demon-strated that lower capacity participants also have amuch greater vulnerability to outside interference,particularly when there is competition between thenew task goal and old habitual responses. ForNeandertals, this might have meant they had moredifficulty changing their ways of manufacturingtools after 200,000 years of sameness, given theirskilled-cognitions, especially motor skills, whichoften require many more trials to master than doverbal skills. With EWM, modern humans mayhave had a distinct advantage defending againstthe interference from habitual responses, bothverbal and motor. Kane et al. (2001) have alsodemonstrated this same vulnerability to interfer-ence of low capacity participants to attention-capturing visual tasks. Conway et al. (2001) havefound similar results in verbal acoustic-attentiontasks. Those participants with lower fluid intelli-gence had similar failed goal maintenance in thepresence of interference as those participants withlower working memory capacity (e.g., Duncanet al., 1996), further supporting the link betweenworking memory capacity and fluid intelligence.In summary, there is some neuropsychologicalbasis for thinking that Neandertals may have hadtrouble adjusting to novel conditions, particularlythose that might have required new ways of behav-ing outside the range of their individual expertabilities.

In sum, psychological, anthropological, archae-ological, and neuropsychological evidence come


together in a way that allows us to draw a pictureof Neandertal cognition. Neandertals regularlyemployed an expert cognition fully as effective asthat used by modern humans. Such expert cog-nition was very effective and flexible, and able todeal with all of the problems of Neandertal life,much as it deals with most of the problems in oureveryday life. What was missing from Neandertalcognition was the enhancement of workingmemory that enabled regular innovation andexperimentation.

The Chatelperronian

This model of Neandertal cognition also helpsus understand the nature of information trans-fer evident in Chatelperronian assemblages.1

Traditionally the modern elements found in theChatelperronian have inspired interpretations ofimitation or independent invention (d’Errico et al.,1998). Imitation advocates appear only to mean“learned from” rather than any of the moredetailed definitions available from the comparativeliterature, where imitation requires copying at leastpart of a specific motor sequence (Tomasello et al.,1987; Whiten and Ham, 1992; Tomasello, 1994).The nature of Chatelperronian stone tools, and theapparent expertise of Neandertal stone knappers,actually suggests that Neandertals acquiredmodern features through “emulation.” This isa form of observational learning in which thesubject understands the goal but invents his orher own procedure for achieving it. For theChatelperronian this is most apparent from thetechnique of blade production. There can be littledoubt, given the flexibility inherent in retrieval

structures when applied to familiar problems,that Neandertals could learn prismatic core tech-niques by applying retrieval cues and structuresdeveloped over a lifetime of stone knapping. Butfor Chatelperronian blades, the Neandertals usedlarge, thick flakes or small blocks for cores, andremoved the blade along a prepared crest (d’Erricoet al., 1998: S 13). This is unlike true prismatic coretechnique, and a bit like Levallois in its emphasison prepared surfaces, which is precisely what onewould expect if Neandertals invented their owntechnique, i.e., emulated the goal of blade produc-tion. Given the sophistication of Levallois retrievalstructures, examination of a blade from a pris-matic core would have been sufficient to generate aproblem solution. Such cues as ridge orientation,convexities, striking platform, and so on, wouldhave called up possible solutions from long-termmemory. Minimal trial and error would have soonproduced the solution we see in the archaeologicalrecord. Similar goal emulation could have pro-duced all of the modern elements we see inChatelperronian culture without the necessity ofinvoking instruction or direct observation of theprocedure. In other words, it is not necessary thatNeandertals ever directly observed modern humanknapping; they could have reconstructed a pro-cedure by observing the debitage alone. Indeed,the nature of Chatelperronian knapping suggeststhat Neandertals rarely, if ever, directly observed amodern human knapping. Given the sophisticationof their own knapping abilities and retrieval struc-tures, they almost certainly would have been ableto reproduce prismatic core techniques as preciselyas if they had actually observed the procedure. Wepresent these arguments in more detail elsewhere(Coolidge and Wynn, in press).

Neandertal personality

There is no widely accepted definition of theterm “personality” in psychology; indeed somepersonality textbooks eschew a single definitionentirely. It has often been defined globally as thesum total of a person’s behavior, and it has alsobeen defined eclectically vis-a-vis a specific psycho-logical theory, e.g., Freudian psychoanalytic

1 We are fully aware of the controversy concerning thechronology, stratigraphy, taphonomy, and typology ofChatelperronian and early Aurignacian assemblages in westernEurope (Mellars, 1996, 1999; d’Errico et al., 1998; d’Errico,2003; Zilhao and d’Errico, 1999; Conard and Bolus, 2003). Ourinterpretation presumes some temporal overlap between Nean-dertal and modern human populations, and in this sense comesdown on the side of acculturation rather than independentdevelopment. Indeed, given what we have been able to recon-struct about Neandertal cognition, independent development ofthe Chatelperronian over such a brief period strikes us asunlikely.


theory (Larsen and Buss, 2002). Nonetheless, someof its accepted attributes are a set of traits, pro-cesses, or mechanisms that are relatively enduringand influence social and environmental inter-actions. Tattersall (2002) has recently pronounced“We have no idea what the Neandertals were liketemperamentally: whether they were aggressive orretiring; cooperative or individualistic; forthrightor sneaky; trusting or suspicious; crude or lovable;or like our own species, all of the above. For allthat we know about Neandertals from the impress-ive record they left behind, we are still unable toform a psychological profile of these hominids thatmight help us to divine how they might haveinteracted with this new element [Cro-Magnons]on the landscape.” (pp. 129–130). But is ourknowledge of Neandertal personality this bleak?Does it actually require divine intervention, ordoes the archaeological record and neuropsycho-logical theory offer us a basis for speculation? Wethink the latter, and shall briefly review thepros and cons of the archaeological evidence ofNeandertal subsistence strategies, archaeologicalevidence for symbolism, anthropological evi-dence for language, and ground our hypothesesaccordingly.

Neandertal hunting has long been a topic ofdebate and disagreement. Binford’s extreme argu-ment (Binford, 1989) that Neandertals were obli-gate scavengers has given way to a more eclecticpicture in which Neandertals employed a variety ofhunting techniques. d’Errico (2003) reviews evi-dence that Neandertals were clearly expert huntersof a wide range of large mammals, includingdangerous species, and concludes that once thezooarchaeological evidence has been carefullyexamined “. little remains to distinguish thesubsistence strategies of Neandertals and anatomi-cally modern humans” (p. 5). However, evidencefrom bone trauma suggests that Neandertalsmay not have been quite as modern as d’Erricoenvisions.

Berger and Trinkaus (1995) found similar post-cranial trauma patterns between Neandertals androdeo athletes, with high levels of head and neckinjuries, as well as high frequencies of shoulder andarm injuries. Neandertals’ low population densitiesappear to make interpersonal violence and belli-

cose behavior a less attractive causal hypothesisand dangerous hunting strategies a more likelyone. They concluded that Neandertals probablykilled their quarry from close range. The spearswere almost certainly thrust, not thrown. Successin such an endeavor relies, ultimately, on personalexpertise—knowledge of animal behavior, timingof the rush, placement of thrusts, pursuit ofwounded animals, deception of other members ofa herd, etc. This kind of hunting is truly dangerousand, even for modern hunters, requires skillslearned over years. But unlike modern hunters,Neandertals appear to have been largely opportun-istic. Neandertals hunted what was available andalmost certainly could be selective when appropri-ate (Gaudzinski and Roebroeks, 2000; but see alsoMunson and Marean, 2003). They were very effec-tive hunters, indeed good enough to flourish in arelatively hostile European glacial environment,but they do not appear to have “tweaked” thesystem by developing closely scheduled seasonalsystems, altering the landscape, or developing stor-age and remote capture systems (Wynn andCoolidge, 2003). In addition to the pattern oftraumatic bone injury, Trinkaus (1995) found highlevels of general wear-and-tear, and degenerativebone disease, but he found not a single case of ahealed lower limb injury that would have pre-vented mobility. This led him to suspect that themaintenance of locomotion was an absolutenecessity in daily Neanderthal life and those whowere not mobile were left behind. All of thisis entirely consistent with the model Neandertalcognition presented above; long-term workingmemory could provide a flexible and effective setof hunting techniques that would work in a widevariety of specific circumstances. Psychologicaltraits that may be inferred from these, particularlythe hunting of more dangerous species, mightinclude bravery, low levels of harm avoidance, andperhaps greater difficulties in making cost-benefitanalyses. Thus, a kind of stoicism may have beenthe norm among Neandertals. From a contem-porary social perspective, one might be tempted toadd cruelty, although current psychological think-ing might require amusement as a motivation forthe cruelty, or cruelty for the sake of dominanceestablishment.


Symbolic capacity and language

Reconstruction of many aspects of Neandertalmental life hinges on an understanding of symboluse and language. Below we treat them separately.

Symbol use in general has long been linked tofrontal lobe function (e.g., Luria, 1966). Whilesymbolic reference, per se, probably does notdepend on working memory, the use of symbolscertainly would. Symbols are tokens that can beheld in attention, and manipulated by workingmemory, so any enhancement of working memorywould provide greater capacity for the deploymentof symbols. If Neandertals and modern humansdid differ in their working memory capacity, wewould expect there to have been some difference intheir use of symbols. Despite serious methodologi-cal problems, linked largely to taphonomic pro-cesses, the archaeological record for mortuarytreatment and art appears to support this scenario.

By 30,000 years ago, modern human burialincluded features unknown for Neandertals. Oneof the best examples is from Sungir in Russia,which dates to about 32,000 to 30,000 (White,1993). This site contained the remains of a youngboy covered with strands of beads, 4903 in total.He wore a cap of beads with fox teeth attached.His belt contained over 250 polar fox canine teeth,which required a minimum of 63 hunted ortrapped fox to produce it. In his grave, there wasalso a carved mammoth ivory pendant and acarved ivory disc. Beside him was also a mammothivory lance, much too large and heavy to havebeen a practical hunting weapon. An adjacentgrave contained the body of a young girl with 5247beads and other objects (but curiously, no foxteeth). White (1993) has estimated the time tofashion the beads might have required over 3500hours. At Qafzeh in Israel a burial of a modernhuman dating to between 90 and 110 Ka(Schwarcz et al., 1988) includes personal orna-ments [perforated and color-stained shells(d’Errico et al., 2003)]. Such burials stand in starkcontrast to Neandertal burials, where there arefew, if any, convincing examples of grave goods.White et al. (2003) have recently documented amuch earlier example of probable mortuary (or atleast post-mortem) treatment of corpses. On the

three Herto skulls from Ethiopia, which date tobetween 160 to 154 Ka, White and his colleaguesfound evidence of post-mortem defleshing andpolishing. These are skulls of anatomically modernhumans. It is impossible, of course, to identifyspecific symbolic meanings to such actions, butnothing like it has so far been identified forNeandertals.

Evidence for Neandertal art is meager. They diduse ochre and other mineral pigments (d’Erricoet al., 2003), and did produce enigmatic non-figurative engravings on bones (Bednarik, 2003).There is nothing, however, that approaches theartistic performances of European Upper Palaeo-lithic artists. Lewis-Williams (2002) sees thedemands of two-dimensional cave art as requiringmuch greater cognitive ability than Neandertalswere likely to have possessed. For Lewis-Williams,the representational pictures of cave art, alongwith highly ritualized burials and carvings, impliedthat modern humans had a hierarchical, or at leastdifferentiated, society that was not simply based onage, sex, or physical strength. The bulk of thisevidence also leads Lewis-Williams to speculatethat Neandertals had a different form of con-sciousness from modern humans and that theirmental imagery may have been more closely tied totheir skilled motor cognition.

The archaeological record for symbolic behav-ior is controversial, to say the least [see the recentreview by d’Errico et al. (2003)]. We are notsuggesting that Neandertals lacked symbolicability, only that the archaeological evidence forsymbol use among Neandertals is far less extensivethan it is for modern humans. This is in keepingwith our hypothesis that the difference lay in thecapacity of working memory.

Because our model of Neandertal mental liferelies on a relatively lower capacity for workingmemory, we must consider the potential effects ofthis on language. The relatively minor geneticmutation we have proposed may have increasedthe length of phonological storage of modernhuman working memory, and this enhancement inphonological store may have had a significantimpact on language. Modern neuropsychologicalassessment methods typically measure phonologi-cal storage by the Digit Span subtest of the


Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (e.g., Lezak,1995). The Digit Span subtest requires participantsto repeat increasingly long strings of numbersforwards and then backwards. Interestingly, thissubtest usually produces the lowest correlationwith IQ among all other subtests (although it doescorrelate strongly), and it is thought to be a bettermeasure of attention than of IQ. If modernhumans benefited from a mutation-based increasein phonological storage, then the neural cognitivearchitectural differences need not have beenmuch different from that of Neandertals. Infact, they could have been nearly identical. Phono-logical storage, as Baddeley and Logie (1999)have recently proposed, may be the bottleneckof language comprehension and production.Increased phonological storage may have allowedmodern humans greater articulatory rehearsal,allowing for better long-term storage, greater self-reflection, and the beginnings of introspection andself-reflection. Greater phonological storage wouldhave allowed increases in syntactical complexity.Sentences could be longer and contain more infor-mation, and they could also be imbued with moremeaning through syntactical embedding. A greaterphonological store might also permit greatermorphemological richness. While the native abilityto produce different morphemes might not havebeen directly affected, the ability to hold andmaintain new and various morphemes might havebeen enhanced by an increase in phonologicalstorage.

The increase in phonological storage might alsohave increased the pragmatics of speech, includingan enhancement of modes of speech. For example,simple declarative sentences could now con-tain more information. Commands (imperativemode) could become more complex. Questions(interrogative mode) could contain more specificinformation as well, and the results might havebeen greater efficiency, clarity, and more effectivecommunication.

The creation and enhancement of the subjunc-tive mode of speech [Klein and Edgar’s (2002)“what if” statements] or the greater developmentof the future tense in language due to an increasein phonological storage requires particular atten-tion. In part, because of its highly transient nature,

working memory would not necessarily benefitfrom memories of the past, stored in long-termmemory. So how would phonological storageaid the prediction of the future? Baddeley (2001)proposed that working memory would allow forthe reflection of multiple past experiences. Thismight allow the individual to actively choose afuture action or create an alternative action, ratherthan simply choosing the path of most probablesuccess. Although an individual would still bebetter off (compared to one without benefit of pastexperience) choosing alternatives simply based onthe past, Baddeley proposed that working memorywould allow for the formulation of mental modelsof future behavior. Shepard (1997) described asimilar working-memory and long-term memorydichotomy. He postulated that natural selectionfavored a perceptual and representational systemable to provide implicit knowledge of the pervasiveand enduring properties of the environment(long-term memory) and that natural selection alsofavored a heightened degree of voluntary access tothis representational system (working memory).This access, he proposed, facilitated the accuratemental simulation of varying actions, allowing theevaluation of the success or failure of these actionswithout taking a physical risk. Shepard thoughtthat the mere accumulation of facts (as inBaddeley’s semantic memory or Mithen’s naturalhistory intelligence or technical intelligence) wouldnot result in advances in scientific human knowl-edge but its advancement would require “thoughtexperiments.” He also postulated that everyreal experiment might have been preceded bythought experiments (which we think is directedby working memory) that increased the prob-ability of the success of the real experiment.Dawkins (1989) also proposed that natural selec-tion would have favored the reproductive successof those organisms capable of simulation. Hedescribed systems highly similar to those ofexecutive functions and replete with the executivefunctions metaphor. For example, he viewed con-sciousness as the culmination of an evolutionarytrend in which consciousness served as executivedecision-makers with the acquired “ability to pre-dict the future and act accordingly” (Dawkins,1989: 59).


Sugiyama (2001) has recently argued thatnarratives, folklore, or story-telling (all of whichmay be clearly categorized as episodic memories)may have been selected because they are anefficient and safe means of transferring infor-mation. Verbal representations are substitutes fortime-consuming and sometimes dangerous first-hand experience. She posits that fitness in varyinghabitats may have particularly aided foragingknowledge by transmitting information aboutgeography, plants, fauna, weather, and otheraspects. We surmise that increased phonologicalstorage would serve to create and store moreelaborate stories (which thus contain greater infor-mation), and serve as a better and larger “stage”for their recall from long-term memory. Arsuaga(2001) has further postulated that Neandertalsmay not have had the myth-making and story-telling abilities possessed by modern humans, andthat the latter’s enhanced abilities kept them inbetter contact with their natural world, their peers(local and distant), and their ancestors.

An increase in phonological storage could havealso aided in cross-modal thinking. Hermer andcolleagues (Hermer and Spelke, 1996; Hermer-Vasquez et al., 1999) found that, in both childrenand adults, success in a cross-modal task requiresthe conjoint use of spatial vocabulary with non-geometric information in a single thought ormemory (e.g., “it’s to the right of the blue one”),and it is not dependent on IQ, age, or vocabularysize. As a whole, the findings support Carruthers’s(2002) contention that language serves as thevehicle of inter-modular thinking, and we contendthat increased phonological storage allowedlanguage to “load up” additional information in asingle spoken or subvocalized thought that gavemodern humans their ultimate selective advantageover Neandertals. We believe the scenario wouldbe the same if this minor genetic mutation wasnot specific to phonological storage but actuallyenhanced general working memory capacity,which is our speculation as to the nature of thegenetic mutation. We believe the greater sophisti-cation in behavior resulting from increased phono-logical storage would have been the same had themutation involved an increase in working memorycapacity.

Back to personality

So what does a lack of EWM, and an abbrevi-ated phonological store, mean for Neandertals’personality? First and probably foremost, wethink that there might have been dramaticlanguage differences between modern humans andNeandertals. We contend that EWM enabled acognitively different form of culture, as epitomizedby the highly ritualized burials such as Sungir andornate parietal art, with its implications for thepresence of sophisticated and extensive symbol-based systems of thought. If we are correct, thenthe language of Neandertals may have been prag-matically restricted to declarative, imperative, andexclamatory modes of speech. Interrogative speechwas probably more limited, and we hypothesizesubjunctive speech may have been non-existentor severely limited, as was the use of the futuretense. In this regard, modern humans wouldhave seemed loquacious, while Neandertals mighthave appeared more laconic. Story-telling andnarratives used by modern humans might havebeen as ornate as present-day story-telling, whileNeandertal stories might have been simpler andless inventive (e.g., Arsuaga, 2001).

If we could look back in time, would we haveseen Neandertals laugh less? Mithen (1996) isalone in addressing the issue of Neandertal humor,and he proposes a less humorous Neandertal. Hebases his speculation on the presumed lack ofintegration between the natural history intelligenceand social intelligence of Neandertals. This lack ofcognitive fluidity, he postulates, would have putNeandertal at a disadvantage when attempting toappreciate appropriate incongruities, one import-ant aspect of some types of humor. There are, ofcourse, other types of humor, and there is noreason to suspect that Neandertals would not findsome aspects of physical humor funny (e.g., muchof the sort we call slapstick), particularly ifthe situation was appropriate. We speculate thatNeandertal humor, given the hypothesized lack ofEWM and a restriction in linguistic comprehen-sion and production, might lack an appreciationfor language-based humor, including plays-on-words and puns. Given that the archaeologicalrecord gives us a picture of the hardness and


difficulties of daily living in Neandertal culture,might Neandertal humor have had an element ofcruelty or might it have been devoid of humorcompletely?

The only neuropsychological basis for the latterspeculation is a dangerous one: case studies ofpatients with frontal lobe dysfunction and inter-ruptions of executive functions and workingmemory. The danger in the use of such studies liesin assuming the behavioral sequelae of brain dam-age are the same as the sequelae of restrictedworking memory. With this caveat in mind, frontallobe-impaired patients (e.g., Levin et al., 1991) aregenerally reported as humorless or laugh inappro-priately. Other symptoms include apathy, dis-inhibition, and emotional dysregulation. Theyusually lack initiative, creativity, and spontaneity.They most often speak only when spoken to. Theirspeech is sparse and frequently confined to simpledeclarative and imperative modes rather than thesubjunctive. They often neglect personal hygieneand become unwashed and unkempt. They havenarrow interests and do not engage in formerhobbies, nor do they take up new hobbies orinterests. They have a high tolerance for boredom.They are often seen as inflexible, preferring to stickto old habits and ways. Their families perceivethem as easily angered or irritated. They are nottypically guilt-ridden or overly anxious. They showlittle or no grief. More often than not, frontal lobepatients frequently lose interest in sex, althoughthere are rare instances of hypersexuality. They areoften immodest and crude. They are not overlywily and crafty. Their methods for getting whatthey want are more likely to be blunt and overt.They show little joy and have little empathy (show-ing reduced or absent ability to understand theperspectives of others). In the more strict defini-tions of executive functions, frontal lobe patientsare usually indecisive, show poor planning abili-ties, and are disorganized when it comes to goalattainment. They have great difficulty withabstractions and metaphors. Innovation andcreativity are completely absent. Finally, theyoften fail to complete tasks despite the ability to doso (e.g., Luria, 1966; Lezak, 1982; Levin et al.,1991; Mega and Cummings, 1994; Lezak 1995;Coolidge et al., 1996; Coolidge et al., 1998; Miller

and Cummings, 1999; Goldberg, 2001; Stuss et al.,2001).

Again, there is danger is extrapolating fromneuropsychological studies of frontal lobe brain-damaged patients to normally functioning ones.However, these studies do give some basis forreasoned speculation; we need not conclude thatthere is no basis whatsoever for postulating differ-ences between Neandertals and other humans.Many of the personality traits listed previouslymay result from impairment of working memory,which is, after all, a well-established frontal lobefunction. Many are in fact consistent with themodel of Neandertal cognition presented earlier inthis paper, i.e., heavy reliance on long-termworking-memory, with little or no excess capacityfor creativity and innovation. In the current stateof understanding in neuropsychology, we cannotbe more specific. However, the evidence is suf-ficient to conclude that Neandertal personality,while obviously perfectly normal for Neandertals,would have been very different from that of atypical modern human.

Conclusions

The preceding analysis has combined conceptsand methods of three disciplines to draw a sketchof Neandertal cognition. We do not pretend thatthis is a comprehensive picture; such a feat isprobably impossible. However, we believe that wehave made a strong case for Neandertals’ relianceon a long-term working memory capability thatwas essentially modern in scope. This ability ismost apparent in the technical domain of stoneknapping, but is also consistent with otherarchaeologically documented activities includ-ing effective hunting. We also believe thatNeandertals’ low levels of innovation andcreativity attest to a lower capacity of workingmemory. We do not suggest that Neandertals hadno working memory, only that its capacity waslower, either in terms of a smaller phonologicalstore, or a reduced attention capacity. This cog-nitive profile has also allowed us to speculateabout associated personality characteristics,including stoicism, tolerance for boredom, low


levels of harm avoidance, and difficulties in costbenefit judgments. Reliance on long-term workingmemory clearly provided a very successful adap-tation; L-TWM is a very flexible form of cognitionthat can respond appropriately to a huge range ofnew, but familiar situations. It is important tore-emphasize that most of what modern humansdo is based on L-TWM. The enhanced workingmemory that appears to have accompanied theevolution of modern humans enabled much higherlevels of innovation, thought experiment, andnarrative complexity. In the long run, these yieldeda way of life that ultimately led to the demise ofNeandertals.

From this model of Neandertal cognition it ispossible to generate certain predictions or expec-tations about the paleoanthropological record.Even though the model is far from comprehensive,it does allow identification of patterns that wouldbe consistent with Neandertal cognition, and pat-terns that would be inconsistent. It also permitsspeculation about the evolutionary antecedents ofNeandertal cognition.

The Neandertal paleoanthropological recordshould regularly demonstrate certain characteris-tics. The first is technical mastery and sophisti-cation. Neandertals would have been fully capableof learning and mastering any basic stone-agetechnology, including prismatic core technique(indeed, it is quite possible that their level oftechnical expertise could learn any modern techno-logical activity). Second, Neandertals should dem-onstrate effective long term adaptations to localenvironments that included flexibility in the faceof shifting conditions. Third, variability inNeandertal material culture should map ontovariations in local conditions. Fourth, there shouldbe only a limited amount of technical variabilityattributable to drift, i.e., small non-directionalchanges in technique resulting from small errors inintergenerational transmission of technical knowhow.

On the other hand, the Neandertal paleoanthro-pological record should not yield evidence ofcertain other activities. For example, there shouldbe no evidence for long range contingency plan-ning, such as that practiced by native Australiansin scheduled burning of specific areas to encourage

a second green-up of grass (Lewis, 1982); or evi-dence for rapid, directional change in technologythat results from conscious invention and exper-imentation; or evidence of long range social net-works. Any of these would be outside the scope ofexpertise based on L-TWM, and would constitutestrong evidence against our hypothesis.

Finally, this model of Neandertal cognitionprovides a basis for speculating about what wentbefore. Given the diffuse neurological storage oflong-term memories, one simple prediction is thatearlier hominids with a smaller neocortex andsmaller association cortices would have had areduced LTM capacity. One result would be along-term working memory capable of storingfewer and less sophisticated retrieval structures.This alone would result in less flexibility in expertperformance; technology, for example, would beless finely tuned to local circumstances. It is alsolikely that smaller cortices would be associatedwith smaller working memory capacities than thatof Neandertals, with attendant consequences forcomplexity of plans of action.

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