... social structure. Another suggestion is that brain size correlates with other factors, such as tool use, longevity or dietary foraging strategy, but brain size could be a partial result of primates having an intricate ecological position regarding social structure. This hypothesis is called the Machiavellian Intelligence hypothesis or the Social Brain hypothesis, & suggests that the sophisticated primate's social structure, with its characteristics of cooperativity & deception led to an advantage for larger brains. This paper looks at the neural foundations of social cognition using lesion studies & functional imaging in the context of what is already known about social cognition, from anthropological, comparative & developmental studies. There are various studies that suggest there are specialised systems within the brain for processing socially relevant information. In the 1930's Kluver & Bucy found that when they inflicted large lesions on monkey brains across the amygdala, temporal neo-cortex & neighbouring areas the monkeys ...

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