Countering the prevailing notion that humankind is naturally predisposed to war, new research suggests that primitive humans existed mostly peacefully, with war developing much later than previously thought.

The study’s author, Patrik Soderberg, who worked with a team from Abo Academy University in Finland and published their research in the journal Science, said their research questioned “the idea that human nature, by default, is developed in the presence of making war and that war is a driving force in human evolution.”

The findings, Soderberg said, challenge “the idea that war was ever-present in our ancestral past.”

The study, “paints another picture where the quarrels and aggression were primarily about interpersonal motives instead of groups fighting against each other,” said Soderberg.

The research pulls from observations of modern day people and tribes who are still isolated from contemporary society—living like hunter-gatherers did thousands of years ago—as the best living examples of how humans interacted in primitive times.