Polygyny without wealth: popularity in gift games predicts polygyny in BaYaka Pygmies.

ABSTRACT: The occurrence of polygynous marriage in hunter-gatherer societies, which do not accumulate wealth, remains largely unexplored since resource availability is dependent on male hunting capacity and limited by the lack of storage. Hunter-gatherer societies offer the greatest insight in to human evolution since they represent the majority of our species' evolutionary history. In order to elucidate the evolution of hunter-gatherer polygyny, we study marriage patterns of BaYaka Pygmies. We investigate (i) rates of polygyny among BaYaka hunter-gatherers; (ii) whether polygyny confers a fitness benefit to BaYaka men; (iii) in the absence of wealth inequalities, what are the alternative explanations for polygyny among the BaYaka. To understand the latter, we explore differences in phenotypic quali

SUBMITTER: Chaudhary N 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4453254 | biostudies-literature | 2015 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature