11

Understanding Culture, Society and Politics – Grade 11

Quarter 1 – Module 11: The Role of Culture in Human Adaptation
First Edition, 2020

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Published by the Department of Education - Schools Division of Pasig City

Development Team of the Self-Learning Module

Writer: Edwin P. Oliver
Editor: Gerolyn A. Postrano
Reviewers: Gerolyn A. Postrano
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Management Team: Ma. Evalou Concepcion A. Agustin
OIC-Schools Division Superintendent
Aurelio G. Alfonso EdD
OIC-Assistant Schools Division Superintendent
Victor M. Javeña EdD
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Librada L. Agon EdD (EPP/TLE/TVL/TVE)

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Norlyn D. Conde EdD (MAPEH/SPA/SPS/HOPE/A&D/Sports)
Wilma Q. Del Rosario (LRMS/ADM)
Ma. Teresita E. Herrera EdD (Filipino/GAS/Piling Larang)
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 Understanding
Culture, Society, and
11
Politics

Quarter 1
Self-Learning Module 11
The Role of Culture in Human
Adaptation
Introductory Message

For the Facilitator:

Welcome to the Understanding Culture, Society, and Politics Grade 11

Module on The Role of Culture in Human Adaptation!

This Self-Learning Module was collaboratively designed, developed and

reviewed by educators from the Schools Division Office of Pasig City headed by its
Officer-in-Charge Schools Division Superintendent, Ma. Evalou Concepcion A.
Agustin, in partnership with the City Government of Pasig through its mayor,
Honorable Victor Ma. Regis N. Sotto. The writers utilized the standards set by the K
to 12 Curriculum using the Most Essential Learning Competencies (MELC) in
developing this instructional resource.

This learning material hopes to engage the learners in guided and independent
learning activities at their own pace and time. Further, this also aims to help learners
acquire the needed 21st century skills especially the 5 Cs, namely: Communication,
Collaboration, Creativity, Critical Thinking, and Character while taking into
consideration their needs and circumstances.

In addition to the material in the main text, you will also see this box in the
body of the module:

Notes to the Teacher

This contains helpful tips or strategies that
will help you in guiding the learners.

As a facilitator you are expected to orient the learners on how to use this
module. You also need to keep track of the learners' progress while allowing them to
manage their own learning. Moreover, you are expected to encourage and assist the
learners as they do the tasks included in the module.
 For the Learner:

Welcome to the Understanding Culture, Society, and Politics Module on

The Role of Culture in Human Adaptation!

This module was designed to provide you with fun and meaningful
opportunities for guided and independent learning at your own pace and time. You
will be enabled to process the contents of the learning material while being an active
learner.

This module has the following parts and corresponding icons:

Expectations - This points to the set of knowledge and skills

that you will learn after completing the module.

Pretest - This measures your prior knowledge about the lesson

at hand.

Recap - This part of the module provides a review of concepts

and skills that you already know about a previous lesson.

Lesson - This section discusses the topic in the module.

Activities - This is a set of activities that you need to perform.

Wrap-Up - This section summarizes the concepts and

application of the lesson.

Valuing - This part integrates a desirable moral value in the

lesson.

Posttest - This measures how much you have learned from the
entire module.
 EXPECTATIONS

In this lesson, the students are expected to:

1. Discuss the role of culture in human adaptation;

2. Analyze the main factors and causes of cultural change; and
3. Explain the ways of human adaptation to the sudden change of culture
caused by unforeseen events.

PRE-TEST

Direction: Match column A to B. Write the letter of your answer before the
number.

A B
1. The process by which a species gets to a. Cultural evolution
be fitted to its environment; it is the b. Genetics
result of natural selection’s acting upon c. Cultural change
heritable variety over a few eras d. Biological adaptation
2. Concept that denotes some internal and e. Acclimatization
external factors leading to change in the
cultural pattern of societies.
3. The idea states that human cultural
change in the beliefs, knowledge,
customs skills, attitudes, and languages
of humans over time.
4. It is a process by which individual
organism adjusts to a change in its
environment, permitting it to maintain
the performance that changes the
condition of the environment.
5. It is environmentally specific in which a
particular gene may be damaging to
have in another environment.
 RECAP
Direction: Explain the following questions briefly.

1. What are the stages of human evolution?

____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
2. How did hominids evolve into modern humans?
____________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________

LESSON

The Role of Culture in Human Adaptation

Today, the world has suddenly changed the way people behave because of the
pandemic Corona Virus 19 (COVID 19) that has been shrouded in fear of mankind.
The World Health Organization (WHO) is leading the way in assessing the rapid
spread infections that lead to change in normal lives. On the other hand,
technological advances play an important role in the gradual transformation of our
lives. One of the best examples in this transformation is the emerging use of
technologies such as mobile phones that are now part and parcel of our daily lives.
This advancement and improvement of mobile phones only shows how culture
change over time (Dizon 2019).

What is Cultural Evolution?

Cultural evolution is the idea that human cultural change in the beliefs,
knowledge, customs skills, attitudes, and languages of humans over time. It
proposes that as human transform themselves, their culture becomes progressively
complex due to social environmental, and biological factors (Dizon 2019). Cultural
evolution is also called sociocultural evolution, the development of one or more
culture from simpler to more complex forms (Pauls 2020). It was believed that social
change resulted from biological adaptation, but anthropologists now commonly
accept that social changes arise in consequence of a combination of social,
evolutionary and biological influences ( Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 2020).

What is Biological Adaptation?

Biological adaptation, in science, is the process by which a species gets to be

fitted to its environment; it is the result of natural selection’s acting upon heritable
variety over a few eras. Organisms are adjusted to their environments in a great
variety of ways: in their structure, physiology, and genetics, in their movement or
dispersal, in their means of defense and attack, in their generation and improvement,
and in other regards (Pauls 2020).

Types of Biological Adaptation:

Acclimatization. It is a process by which individual organism adjusts to a change

in its environment, permitting it to maintain the performance that changes the
condition of the environment. It is also called acclimation or acclimatation in
which a change occurs in a short period of time or within the organism’s lifetime.

Short-term acclimatization can happen within seconds of exposure and quickly

reverses when the stressor is no longer present.

Developmental Acclimatization. This happens during an individual’s growth and

development. The term is also known as ontological acclimatization or
developmental adjustment (Lumen Cultural Anthropoloogy n.d.). This adaptation
can take months to years to acquire. Humans who migrate permanently to higher
altitude naturally acclimatize to their new environment by developing an increase in
the number of red blood cells to increase the oxygen carrying capacity of the blood,
in order to compensate for lower level of oxygen intake.

Genetics. According to O’Neil, adaptation occurs when a stressor is constant

and lasts for many generations (Lumen Cultural Anthropoloogy n.d.). This type is
also called environmentally specific in which a particular gene may be damaging to
have in another environment. Skin color, body size and shape, and race are examples
of human genetic adaptation.

Cultural Change
Cultural change is a concept that denotes some internal and external factors
leading to change in the cultural pattern of societies (Chand n.d.).
 In the article of Chand the main factors and causes of cultural change were
discussed:

Factors of Cultural Change

 Contact. The contact between two societies will obviously change the culture
of both the societies through the process of “cultural diffusion” and
“acculturation”.
 Technology Evolution. Any technological evolution is the country will bring
a change their culture. For Example, changes in production technology,
changes in the means of communication, changes in the means of
transportation, etc.
 The geographical and ecological factor. The geographical and ecological
factor is a natural or a physical factor. The climate or rainfall, attitude of the
place, closeness to the sea decides the culture lifestyle of the people. Any
change in the physical features will automatically lead to a change in their
culture, habits and way of living.

Causes of Cultural Changes

 Sometimes members of a society are often confronted by customs that differ

from those which they have learnt to accept.
 New customs and practices are likely to be more readily adopted under to
conditions. (1) If they represent what is viewed as socially desirable and useful
and (2) If they do not clash with re-existed and still valued customs and
practices.
 Changes in culture are always super imposed on existing culture especially
during cultural contact.
 All the cultural changes are not equally important. Some changes are
introduced to culture because they are considered necessary for human
survival. Some other changes are accepted in order to satisfy socially acquired
needs not essential for survival.
 It is a fact of common observation that crisis tends to produce or accelerate
cultural changes. If the changes are accepted once due to the crisis, they tend
to persist.
  Cultural change leads no to chain reaction, whenever a change is incorporated
into the culture and becomes defined as a ‘social necessity’, new needs
emerge, generating the desire for still further changes to compliment or
supplement the original change.

ACTIVITIES

PWEDE NAMAN PALA

The National Capital Region is the epicenter of pandemic COVID 19 spreading
in our country. With the advent of living in the New Normal, survival is a test that
everyone will face. It may not be our ordinary way of life, but it is one of the ways
for salvation.

List the ordinances of LGU here in Pasig or the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF)
implementation based on the “Bayanihan to Heal as One Act” during Enhanced
Community Quarantine (ECQ). Relate these ordinances to the change on how you
live and provide reasons how municipality can take advantage of it inasmuch as
people’s welfare as a whole is concerned. Choose three (3) best policies that you want
to continue and write your reasons. After doing this activity, you may send a copy
of this to google classroom account.

Policy Reasons
1. 1.
2. 2
3. 3.

Processing Questions:
1. Even before COVID- 19 spread throughout the world, we are free to do what
we want without fear. How does this pandemic affect your ordinary daily
activities? What drastic adjustments did you make?
2. How has your family prepared for such changes caused by new strict law
enforcement or intense fear of being infected with the virus?
 3. In the adaptation of new normal life, the culture had been changed. To what
extent do these changes affect your ordinary activities?
4. Government preventive measures are one of the main causes of the sudden
change in our culture to stop the spread of the disease. What are your
takeaways in this situation?

WRAP-UP

Directions: Adaptation plays a significant role in human evolution which resulted to

biological and cultural changes. Most changes arise in consequence of a combination
of social, evolutionary and biological influences What do you think is the significant
role of adaption in the process of evolution?

__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________

Photo: Google/shutterstock.com
 VALUING

“We are not protected from the forces of changes that can cause
extinction. We can see now how vulnerable we are to disease epidemics like
COVID 19, Ebola, HIV, and even the common flu. Natural disasters—on the
rise due to climate change—can render us defenseless and vulnerable.
Technology can help us, but we can’t assume it will save us.” Lauren Saville.

In this way we can mitigate the number of victims in times of disaster.

Using the template below, draw or write simple things you can do to help
protect the earth.
 POSTTEST

Direction: Identify what is being described in the following statements. Choose

the letter of your answer inside the box and write the letters on the space provided
before the items.

a. Geographical & ecological f. Sociocultural evolution

b. Cultural change g. Technology evolution
c. Acclimatization h. Genetics
d. Biological adaptation i. Developmental acclimatization
e. Cultural diffusion & acculturation j. Cultural evolution

____1. This type of biological adaptation is also called environmentally specific in

which a particular gene may be damaging to have in another environment

____2. Changes in the means of communication, changes in the means of

transportation, etc. is an example of ____________.

____3. This factor of cultural change is also called natural or a physical factor.

____4. A concept that denotes some internal and external factors leading to change in the cultural
pattern of societies.

____5. This adaptation can take months to years to acquire.

____6. Adaptation which occurs in a short period of time and within the organism’s
lifetime.
____7. The process by which a species gets to be fitted to its environment; it is the
result of natural selection’s acting upon heritable variety over a few eras.

____8. The development of one or more culture from simpler to more complex forms.

____9. The contact between two societies will obviously change the culture of both
the societies through the process of _____________.

____10. Cultural evolution is also called _______________.

KEY TO CORRECTION

f 10. i 5. b 5.
e 9. b 4. e 4.
j 8. a 3. a 3.
d 7. g 2. c 2.
c 6. h 1. d 1.
Post-test Pre-test

KEY TO CORRECTION
 References
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 2020. Wikipedia. June 14. Accessed June 14, 2020.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_evolution.

Chand, Smriti. n.d. Cultural Change: Main Factors and Causes of Cultural Change.
https://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/culture/cultural-change-main-factors-
and-causes-of-cultural-change/23392.
Dizon, Marilyn. 2019. Scribd/Cultural Evolution of Man. November 12. Accessed
November 12, 2019. https://www.scribd.com/document/434514046/ppg.
Lumen Cultural Anthropoloogy. n.d. Human Adaptation.
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/culturalanthropology/chapter/human-
adaptations/.
Saville, Lauren. 2016. NCSE Nationa Center for Science Education. July 19.
Accessed July 19, 2016. https://ncse.ngo/importance-teaching-human-
evolution.
Pauls, Elizabeth Prine. 2020. Ecyclopaedia Britannica. Accessed 2020.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Fielding-Ogburn.