Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Anthropology Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Boise State University

Series

Human behavioral ecology

Publication Year

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Anthropology

Behavioral Ecology Of The Family: Harnessing Theory To Better Understand Variation In Human Families, Paula Sheppard, Kristin Snopkowski Jul 2021

Behavioral Ecology Of The Family: Harnessing Theory To Better Understand Variation In Human Families, Paula Sheppard, Kristin Snopkowski

Anthropology Faculty Publications and Presentations

Researchers across the social sciences have long been interested in families. How people make decisions such as who to marry, when to have a baby, how big or small a family to have, or whether to stay with a partner or stray are questions that continue to interest economists, sociologists, demographers, and anthropologists. Human families vary across the globe; different cultures have different marriage practices, different ideas about who raises children, and even different notions of what a family is. Human behavioral ecology is a branch of anthropology that is particularly interested in cultural variation of family systems and how …


Ephemeral Work Group Formation Of Jenu Kuruba Honey Collectors And Late 19th Century Coloado Silver Prospectors, Kathryn Demps, Susan M. Glover Klemetti Mar 2014

Ephemeral Work Group Formation Of Jenu Kuruba Honey Collectors And Late 19th Century Coloado Silver Prospectors, Kathryn Demps, Susan M. Glover Klemetti

Anthropology Faculty Publications and Presentations

Humans frequently form short-lived cooperative groups to accomplish subsistence and economic tasks. We explore the ecological and cultural factors behind ephemeral work-group formation in two disparate cultural contexts: groups foraging for wild honey in present day South India and groups prospecting for silver ore in the Elk Mountain Mining District of Colorado in the late 19th century. Contrary to traditional economic foraging predictions, we find little evidence that per capita yields are the most important factor in determining size and composition of ephemeral work groups. We explore factors in each of these cultures that may be of importance for group …