Association theory: a new framework for analyzing social evolution

The dominant social-evolutionary paradigm implicitly equates social actions and behaviors causing associations by extrapolating from models of social actions to explain behaviors affecting association. This extrapolation occurs when models of helping behavior are applied to explain aggregation or fusion, and when models of discriminatory helping behavior are applied to explain discriminatory segregation or discriminatory rejection. Here, I outline an alternative theoretical approach that explicitly distinguishes a social action as a helping or harming behavior, and an association as the context for a social action. Based on this distinction, I define a list of terms that allows a classification of association phenomena and the conceptual framework necessary to explain their evolution. I apply the resulting theory, which I call “association theory,” to identify a series of steps common to major and minor transitions in social evolution. These steps include the evolution of association, the evolution of differential treatment, the evolution of association preference, and the evolution of genetic kin recognition. I explain how to measure the parameters of association theory and I apply the theory to test Hamilton’s rule. I evaluate the evidence for association theory, including how it resolves anomalies of a former paradigm. Finally, I discuss association theory’s assumptions, and I explain why it may become the dominant framework for analyzing social evolution.