Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-lj6df Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-15T19:54:12.305Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Grandparental transfers and kin selection

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 April 2010

Raymond Hames
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE 68588. rhames@unl.eduhttp://www.unl.edu/rhames

Abstract

In the analysis of intergenerational transfer, several improvements can be made. First, following kin selection theory, grandparents have kin other than grandchildren in which to invest and therefore any investigation into grandparents should take this perspective. Secondly, how transfers actually enhance the survivorship of younger relatives such as grandchildren must be better measured, especially in the ethnographic literature. Finally, the problem of indirect investments or targeting must be considered.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Caldwell, J. C. (1976) Toward a restatement of demographic transition theory. Population and Development Review 2:321–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hames, R. B. (1987) Relatedness and garden labor exchange among the Ye'kwana. Evolution and Human Behavior 8:354–92.Google Scholar
Hames, R. B. & Draper, P. (2004) Women's work, child care and helpers at the nest in a hunter-gatherer society. Human Nature 15:319–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hawkes, K., O'Connell, J. F. & Blurton Jones, N. G. (1989) Hardworking Hadza grandmothers. In: Comparative socioecology: The behavioural ecology of humans and other mammals, ed. Standen, V. & Foley, R. A., pp. 341–66. Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Hrdy, S. B. (2005a) Comes the Child before Man: How cooperative breeding and prolonged postweaning dependence shaped human potentials. In: Hunter–gatherer childhoods: Evolutionary, developmental and colonial perspective, ed. Hewlett, B. S. & Lamb, M. E., pp. 6591. Aldine Transaction.Google Scholar
Kaplan, H. (1994) Evolutionary and wealth flows theories of fertility: Empirical tests and new models. Population and Development Review 20(1):753–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sear, R. & Mace, R. (2008) Who keeps children alive? A review of the effects of kin on child survival. Evolution and Human Behavior 29:118.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Turke, P. W. (1989) Evolution and the demand for children. Population and Development Review 15:6190.CrossRefGoogle Scholar