Across languages, people differ in which of the three basicframes of reference (FoRs) they prefer when describingspatial relations: absolute, intrinsic, or relative. But how muchvariation is there with regard to the relative FoR, which isanchored in the observer and occurs as one of three variants?Is the reflection variant canonical, as assumed by manyscholars? And how are objects in a person’s back referred to:by turning towards the objects? Results from two studies, onewith speakers of Norwegian and Farsi, the other with speakersof German and Japanese, reveal that reflection is notcanonical, but that translation and even rotation are used aswell. In addition, turning towards objects arranged in aperson’s back is very rare; what people use instead is abackward projection strategy that goes without rotation.

Cumulative culture is believed to be a uniquely human form of social learning, and is therefore believed to be key in understanding how humans evolved such complex social organization and technologies. It is reasonable to believe that our capacity for cumulative culture is the result of a series of interconnected, complex evolutionary processes, but humans abilities for teaching, imitation and communication are believed to play a central role. We plan on combining brain imaging techniques and a transmissions chain design with transmission of evolutionary relevant tasks (knot tying and symbol-production) in order to look at the mechanisms of cumulative culture in a new way. By looking at the brain activation involved in acquiring and transferring these skills we aim to offer new insight on the cognitive and behavioral demands of these technologies and their effect on cultural evolution.