Mamie Green

December 4,2018
Anthropology 1020
Research Paper

The Evolution of Bipedalism and Brain Size

As stated in The Role of Bipedalism article by Lovejoy, bipedalism is an essential

adaption of the Hominin progeny that is considered the major force behind several skeletal

changes shared by all the bipedal hominins (Lovejoy 1988). After finding Lucy’s skeleton in 1974

researchers stated that she had the anatomy of a biped and the characteristics that led them to

believe so was the broad pelvis and thigh bones that nailed in towards the knee which brought

the feet in line with the body’s center of gravity and created stability while walking. From all the

research and videos I have watched on this topic, researchers such as Lovejoy and many others

stated that bipedalism is based solely on the placement of its foramen magnum, which is a hole

in the base of the skull through which the spinal cord passes. In the Becoming Human: The

Evolution of Walking Upright article Wayman stated that the easiest hominid with the most

extensive evidence for bipedalism is the 4.4 million-year-old Ardipithecus Ramidus as well as

that of the teeth and two thigh bones of the 6 million-year-old Orrorin Tugenesis (Wayman 2012).

Although we know today that the earliest hominids were capable of walking upright, we also

know that they probably weren’t able to get around exactly as we do today, this was due to

retained primitive features such as long curved fingers and toes as well as longer arms and

shorter legs that indicated they spent more time in trees. Until the emergence of H. Erectus 1.89

million years ago, this is where we start to see that hominids grew tall and evolved long legs and

became completely terrestrial creatures.

 In the 2010 EARTH Magazine article Lovejoy stated that as climatic change was made in

the African forests more seasonal and variable environments would have become harder to

navigate and would have taken more time for individuals to find food. This would have made it

especially difficult for females raising their off spring. It was suggested in Lovejoy’s article that

a mutually beneficial arrangement could have evolved and this is where males were made to be

the provider by gathering resources for their mates and their offspring. While females in return

would mate exclusively with their male providers. In order for this “arrangement” to be

successful the males needed their arms and hands free in order to carry food and thus bipedalism

evolved. In this same magazine article Lovejoy also stated that this would in fact be a hard

hypothesis to test but earlier in 2009 researchers offered some information that supported this

hypothesis. They were able to find that Chimpanzees tend to walk bipedally when needing to

carry rare or valuable foods.

How did our brains dramatically increase? The most complex part about understanding

the evolution of bipedalism and brain size is of course knowing the history, but not only that,

also what bone structures and body evolution that needs to take place in order for this to be

possible. Our species is unique because of our exceptionally large brain relative to body size.

Over this long period of human evolution our brains size has more than tripled. This brain size

increase that we hear so much about was accompanied by the reorganization of the cerebral

cortex. The cerebral cortex, which is responsible for complex and mental functions, which

accounts for about 85% of total brain volume. One question that people may come across often

when covering this topic is how did our brains dramatically increase? Literally and physically.

Well, one theory is that our ancestor’s brains expanded to accommodate development of

language. According to a 7 million-year-old skull from and ancestor provided us with clues that
may have been shaped by the changes in the female reproductive system which is what occurred

when ancestors stood upright. This upright motion that we know to be bipedalism or obstetric

dilemma was the beginning of bipedalism. This switch that we eventually see happening

involved a major reconfiguration of the birth canal. As we look at the bone structure of the

pelvis today it is significantly narrower than it was before because of the change of structure and

around this time is when the brain expanded. One of the many adaptations that happened to

make this increase in the size of our brains was openings in the skull called fontanelles. This

opening in the brain is possible because much like tectonic plates the anterior fontanelle enables

the two frontal bones of the skull to slide past each other, which in turn compresses the head

during birth. The anterior fontanelle also known to us now as the soft spot on your skull in the

early years of life gradually gets smaller as new bone is laid down and by the age of two is fully

closed, and this is what we call metric suture. One of the many interesting facts that I found

while doing my research was chimpanzees and bonobos brain growth occurs mostly in the womb

and is closed around the time of birth. In 1990 researchers from Washington University Medical

School published a three-dimensional CT scan of the Taung Child endocast. This child’s skull

that ranged between 3 and 4 years of age and dates back to 2.5 million years ago had the

remanence of the anterior fontanelle as well which I thought was another interesting fact of

information. This research showed us that the Taung Child has a partially fused metric suture at

the time of death that the pattern of brain development was similar to our modern day humans.

Rapid brain growth in the time following birth came before the emergence of homo

sapiens, thus, researchers in the article from the web stated that “bipedalism and big brains are

independent evolutionary processes. Hominins started walking bipedally long before the brain

expanded, but these trends collided at birth, and we believe this happened much earlier than
previously thought.” (Costandi 2012). There are more ways that bipedalism could have led to

increased brains sizes which would free up the forelimbs and this would have led to the

expansion and reorganization of the sensory and motor brain areas that process sensations and

controls movements. Standing upright also led to an expansion of the visual areas at the back of

the brain. New findings of this websites research support the idea that further brain expansion as

well as reorganization of the prefrontal cortex could have occurred as an indirect result of the

pelvic modification that followed the transition to bipedalism however, many genes that have

been implicated in the evolution of the human brain is difficult to link to any of the specific

changes in the brain organization and structure. Researchers from Costandi’s website article of

research reported that a gene known to be involved in the development of the cerebral cortex was

duplicated multiple times and this occurred exclusively in humans. This duplication that we see

now took place 2 to 3 million years ago so it can be tempting to speculate that they are or have to

be somehow linked to the changes that many have occurred as a result of bipedalism.

In conclusion, I would like to add that the evolution and study of the increase in size of

the human brain and bipedalism was by far one of the most interesting of the three topics to

cover and research. Its such a complex topic but so easily explained and understood and makes

sense.