0:00:15.954,0:00:17.888
When I was in graduate school,

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one thing I often heard[br]was that the goal of anthropology

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is to make the strange familiar[br]and the familiar strange.

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I thought I knew what that meant, [br]but I didn't really understand it

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until the first time[br]I conducted fieldwork.

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In my first year of graduate school,

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I traveled to South America[br]to work with the Shuar,

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an indigenous population[br]in the Ecuadorian Amazon.

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I was studying how children develop[br]across different cultures.

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I had a number of expectations [br]for what that trip would be like.

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I knew I was going to get [br]a lot of bug bites - I did.

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I knew I'd ride a canoe down[br]the winding rivers of the jungle - I did.

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And I knew I'd learn something[br]I didn't know before - and I did.

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I learned what childhood was like[br]in a small scale society.

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I saw independent young kids[br]climbing trees to gather papayas

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when they were hungry.

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I saw them starting fires,

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preparing food[br]for themselves and their siblings

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and even using machetes[br]quite confidently, I might add.

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(Laughter)

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The thing I didn't expect

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was the culture shock[br]of coming back to the United States.

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The strangeness of the Shuar[br]was becoming more familiar to me,

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but suddenly, the familiarity of home[br]started to feel strange.

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Being a child in a foraging society

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is very different than being a child[br]in a Western society.

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In societies like the Shuar,

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children are much more independent [br]or as we like to call it "free-range."

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(Laughter)

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If you grew up in the era [br]before cellphones,

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that might be what your own[br]childhood was like too.

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But for the newest generation of kids,[br]this independance is quickly fading away.

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And that's because childhood has changed[br]very recently and very rapidly.

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For virtually all of our time[br]on this planet,

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for hundreds of thousands of years,

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our species lived in small bands[br]of hunter-gatherers,

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more similar to how the Shuar live now [br]than how the average American lives.

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Then just a few thousand years ago,

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most of our environment[br]started to change a lot.

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In fact, they changed [br]so quickly and so drastically

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that many anthropologists believe

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we are now in a state[br]of evolutionary mismatch.

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This means that the environment[br]has changed too quickly

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for some of our genes to keep up.

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Cultural evolution is much faster[br]than genetic evolution.

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And what this means[br]is that our minds and bodies

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might be optimized for a world[br]that most of us no longer live in.

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So what did this[br]past environment look like?

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Well, it's impossible to perfectly[br]answer this question:

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bones fossilize, behavior doesn't.

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But we can learn a lot by looking[br]at current day societies like the Shuar.

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And I want to clarify here:

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the Shuar are not a prehistoric people[br]or windows into the past;

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they are modern people.

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But their way of life may give us a clue[br]about what childhood was like in the past.

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And what we know

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from looking across a large number[br]of these small-scale societies

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is that there are a lot[br]of common patterns.

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For instance, in virtually[br]all of these societies,

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women give natural birth,

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mothers breastfeed frequently[br]and for long periods of time,

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parents sleep in the same[br]room as their kids

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and children are constantly[br]in physical contact with other people.

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These patterns have started to change[br]in our Western societies:

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here C-sections are more prevalent,[br]as is formula feeding.

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Kids often sleep[br]in their own little rooms,

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and we don't want people

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in physical contact with us[br]or our children.

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We value personal space.

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But let's go back to the idea of mismatch.

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The practices in yellow have marked[br]the human experience

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for 99% of our time on this planet.

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The stuff in blue[br]is just 1% of human history.

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These massive changes[br]have happened so quickly

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that they may be out of whack[br]with the world we are born expecting.

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And we think there are consequences[br]for these changes, both good and bad.

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For instance, C-sections save lives,

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but they also shape the bacteria[br]in our gut and our immune system

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in ways that might[br]have negative consequences.

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But as an anthropoligst[br]who studies behavior,

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one shared feature of these societies[br]that I want to focus on

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and one that I've been able to see[br]for myself is this:

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in small scale societies,[br]alongside the adult community,

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is a complex mini-community of children,[br]an alternate society.

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This child society is made up[br]of kids of all ages and genders.

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It has its own unique culture and leaders.

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It has drama and a surprising amount[br]of political intrigue.

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To understand why this child society[br]is so important for development,

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it helps to keep in mind[br]a curious fact about humans,

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and that is to become [br]a successful adult in any culture,

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children have to learn an enormous [br]number of complicated skills.

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These include both technical skills,[br]like building a fire,

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and social skills,[br]like maintaining friendships.

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And to perfect these skills,[br]which take decades,

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children also develop foundational skills,

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like creativity, determination[br]and problem solving.

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Like, one day, when the Shuar adults[br]were playing a soccer game,

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I saw a group of kids set up their own [br]soccer game right next to the adults.

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When they called me over,

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I got really excited because I thought [br]they wanted me to play with them,

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but they were like,[br]actually, you just keep score,

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so all of us can play.

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(Laughter)

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Problem solved.

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Shuar kids, like kids everywhere,[br]spend a lot of time observing adults

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and incorporating[br]their behaviors into their play.

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In fact, this is one of the reasons[br]the play itself has evolved

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as a way to practice these skills[br]in ways that are low-cost.

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No one has to encourage kids to do this.

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They do it on their own

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because through unstructured play,[br]children learn how to become adults.

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Another important benefit[br]to this mixed-age society

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is that kids teach to [br]and learn from one another.

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Younger kids benefit[br]by learning from older kids

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who are only slightly better than them.

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And through teaching,[br]older kids strengthen their own skills,

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as you may have experienced yourself -[br]teaching helps you learn.

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It's hard to find these patterns[br]in our Western societies.

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Kids here spend the majority[br]of their development

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in a room with other kids[br]their own age by design.

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Adults are totally in charge

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of the content and structure[br]of their time.

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They determine when kids eat.[br]They determine when kids play.

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They even determine[br]when kids can go to the bathroom.

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And the unstrucutred play time of recess

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is now quickly becoming[br]a structured activity.

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A strange byproduct[br]of all this micro-managing

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is that we're teaching kids things[br]that don't even need to be taught.

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Kids don't need to be taught how to play.

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They don't even need[br]to be taught how to talk, really.

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You don't have to point[br]to an apple and say, "This is an apple."

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Kids can also learn through exposure,

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like hearing you ask your husband[br]for an apple and him handing you one.

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"Apples." - done.

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And the idea that it is a parent's duty

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to constantly craft and monitor[br]their children's experiences

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causes a lot of unnecessary anxiety[br]and may, in fact, be detrimental.

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When we take away mixed-aged play groups,[br]when we take away unstructured play,

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we are in fact taking away[br]the training wheels to adulthood

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that children have had for millennia.

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We are contributing to an increasingly[br]mismatch environment.

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What's more,

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instead of letting kids develop[br]foundational skills like problem solving,

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we're flipping to the back of the book[br]to show them the answers.

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But that leaves them unprepared for all [br]the new problems they're going to face.

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This might be one of the reasons

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why the transition to college[br]is so difficult for kids here,

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or why choosing a career path[br]can feel so daunting.

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There's been very little space to explore.

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The lesson is not that we should[br]go back to living like foragers

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or think whatever is natural[br]is what we should do.

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That's the naturalistic fallacy.

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But we would benefit[br]from taking a broader perspective

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and understanding[br]how our evolutionary history

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has shaped the way our minds develop.

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We all want the best for our kids.

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We want them to be independent,[br]confident, problem solvers.

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We want them to be happy.

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But paradoxically,

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our cultural practices in the West[br]might be undermining children's abilities

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to develop these skills.

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It's hard to study the long-term[br]consequences of these changes,

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especially because[br]they're happening so quickly.

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But there are some tried-and-true[br]methods to raising kids

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that we've been using for millennia.

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In fact, we've been using them for so long

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that children minds might actually[br]be expecting them.

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Some of these methods[br]you can start using now.

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Set up more mixed-age[br]play dates for your kids.

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Give them the room[br]they need to make mistakes.

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Give them more unstructured playtime.

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In fact, this is not just an idea

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that's relevant for those[br]who are raising kids

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because even as adults,[br]we are still developing.

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These lessons are applicable to you too.

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Allow yourself to make mistakes.

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Spend time with older family[br]and younger friends.

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Give yourself some unstructured playtime.

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And perhaps recognize[br]that the familiar culture all around you

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is, in fact, very strange.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)