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What Do Men Want? Re-Examining Whether Men Benefit From Higher Fertility Than Is Optimal For Women, Cristina Moya, Kristin Snopkowski, Rebecca Sear

Anthropology Faculty Publications and Presentations

Several empirical observations suggest that when women have more autonomy over their reproductive decisions, fertility is lower. Some evolutionary theorists have interpreted this as evidence for sexual conflicts of interest, arguing that higher fertility is more adaptive for men than women. We suggest the assumptions underlying these arguments are problematic: assuming that women suffer higher costs of reproduction than men neglects the (different) costs of reproduction for men; the assumption that men can repartner is often false. We use simple models to illustrate that 1) men or women can prefer longer interbirth intervals (IBIs), 2) if men can only partner …