Humans are cultural and linguistic animals. There are no other animals of this type, with these characteristics. How did this come to be? Can we understand human development better if we understand our evolutionary history better? In this chapter I consider several perspectives on these questions. I argue that we must recognize both parts of the beginning proposition: On the one hand, we are animals that are closely related to other primate species, and understanding our development in comparison to theirs may shed important light on both basic processes and complex higher-order cognitive developments. On the other hand, the unique characteristics of the human species – language and the complexities of our social and cultural environments – may be better understood by considering the conditions under which these characteristics became established historically as well as developmentally. Underlying this proposition is the assumption that to understand the developmental processes that make language in cognition possible, it is necessary to understand the contributions of functions that precede and enter into its establishment.

Another justification for undertaking the survey in this chapter is the widespread acceptance today of what has been termed “neo-nativism,” varying forms of which all embrace some type of genetic determinism. Many psychologists who reject genetic determinism tend also to ignore or reject biological or evolutionary theories in general as irrelevant to their concerns.