Migration as a Window into the Coevolution between Language and Behavior

Victor Gay (), Daniel Hicks and Estefania Santacreu-Vasut

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: Understanding the causes and consequences of language evolution in relation to social factors is challenging as we generally lack a clear picture of how languages coevolve with historical social processes. Research analyzing the relation between language and socio-economic factors relies on contemporaneous data. Because of this, such analysis may be plagued by spurious correlation concerns coming from the historical co-evolution and dependency of the relationship between language and behavior to the institutional environment. To solve this problem, we propose migrations to the same country as a microevolutionary step that may uncover constraints on behavior. We detail strategies available to other researchers by applying the epidemiological approach to study the correlation between sex-based gender distinctions and female labor force participation. Our main finding is that language must have evolved partly as a result of cultural change, but also that it may have directly constrained the evolution of norms. We conclude by discussing implications for the coevolution of language and behavior, and by comparing different methodological approaches.

Keywords: Culture; Immigrants; Female labor participation; Language structure; Grammar (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J16 J22 J61 Z13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-evo and nep-mig
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Migration as a Window into the Coevolution between Language and Behavior (2016)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pra:mprapa:77566

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