Cultural Change Through Niche Construction: A Multilevel Approach to Investigate the Interplay Between Cultural Change and Infectious Disease

Researchers theorize cultural change as societal adaptation to the environment. But where does the environment come from? Here we advance conceptual and analytical tools for a more dynamic framework of cultural change and emphasize that people create their own environment, to which they adapt through cultural change. First, we draw on the theory of niche construction to argue that organisms modify their environments in ways that impact their own evolution. Second, we advocate for a multilevel approach to analyze heterogeneity of longitudinal processes across multiple units: cultural change can be understood as a within-society process nested within higher-level units that differ across space. We then apply a multilevel distributed lag/lead model to identify the reciprocal causation between ecology and culture. We demonstrate these points by analyzing how cultural changes in individualism and economic prosperity are associated with changing prevalence of tuberculosis (TB, 1993-2018) and sexually transmitted diseases (STD, 1984-2014) across 50 U.S. states. We found evidence for reciprocal causation: (a) Increases in individualism and economic prosperity followed reduction of disease prevalence, and (b) cultural change in those variables decreased TB but increased STD. Moreover, historically collectivistic states were more successful at amplifying the positive impacts of cultural change on reducing TB and attenuating harmful effects of cultural change on increasing STD. In discussion, we encourage a more dynamic approach and expand a range of questions for future research on cultural change. Public Significance Statement Our article argues that cultural change comes from an interactive process between people and their environment, such that people not only adapt to their environment, but also reshape their environment. Focusing on cultural change in all 50 U.S. states, we show how increases in individualism and wealth reduce and increase risks of infectious diseases, which bring out subsequent changes in societal development. We also found that those effects were more pronounced for collectivistic states, where cultural changes were more effectively used to decrease threats of diseases.