Steven Crane Compiled Section Handouts. Human Behavioral Biology 2012

Bands of brothers are exercising kin selection when they team up and annihilate neighboring, unrelated male troupes.

• BUT bonobos are also patrilochal and they just have sex all the time instead of genocide. Interpretation: who knows!?

What patterns of aggression exist in humans as a function of relatedness? How do we make sense of them?

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  Child abuse more likely by fathers, paternal grandfathers than mothers or maternal grandfathers. Child abus eby stepparents more than biological parents. Interpretation: less certainty about paternity makes for more violence, almost like competitive infanticide.
  
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  But the data lends itself to economic interpretations as well, and hasn't been replicated well. So it's iffy on this one.
  

What feature of human kin recognition predisposes us to pseudospeciation and pseudokinship?

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  The fact that we use cognitive strategies to recognize relatives means that they are susceptible to manipulation. Examples of pseudokinship:
  
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    Warriors among Masai cement pseudokinship by using kinship terms for each other and living together and sharing food.
    

  • Israeli military: groups of friends can join as a unit. They've been together since kindergarten and feel like kin.

  • WWII and Civil War both had cases where people were fighting against an enemy that may very well have been more related to them than their allies in battle.

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  And how does this work in the realm of pseudospeciation?
  
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    Making the enemy seem so foreign and evil that they hardly even count as human, hardly count as the same species.
    
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    Example: Gulf War as a result of the concocted Iraqi incubator story.
    

How does evolution influence non-aggression?

What's the alternative reproductive strategy for males besides being aggressive towards competitors?

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  In pair bonding species we have lots of paternal parental investment
  
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  Females also choose nice males. So cooperating and being altruistic and generous can pay off in terms of individual selection.
  

What examples do we have of pseudokinship making for affiliative behavior?

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  Rival Bedouin clans make peace and the "discover" a historical ancestor, providing plausible kinship ties with an enemy.
  
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  Australian Aboriginal groups: when strangers encounter water in the desert, the concoct a relationship based on family pedigrees so they can feel comfortable that the other won't try to kill them over the scarce resources.
  
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  Modern governmental propaganda: Nixon opens China in 1970's and so much emphasis came out on the similarities between Chinese and Americans.
  

What activation patterns does the amygdala show for members of another race?

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  At first it looked like it just activated when viewing members of another race, but it turned out to be more complex than that.
  
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  It DOESN'T activate in what three cases?
  
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    The individual was raised in a diverse neighborhood (contact theory)
    
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