The Evolutionary Biology of Human Female Sexuality - Softcover

Thornhill, Randy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 019534099X ISBN 13: 9780195340990

Publisher: Oxford University Press, U.S.A., 2008

Synopsis

Research conducted in the last fifteen years has placed in question many of the traditional conclusions scholars have formed about human female sexuality. Though conventional wisdom asserts that women's estrus has been evolutionarily lost, Randy Thornhill and Steven W. Gangestad assert that it is present, though concealed. Women, they propose, therefore exhibit two sexualities each ovulatory cycle-estrus and sexuality outside of the estrous phase, extended sexuality-that possess distinct functions. Synthesizing research in behavioral evolution and comparative biology, the authors provide a new theoretical framework for understanding the evolution of human female sexuality, one that is rooted in female sexuality and phylogeny across all vertebrate animals.

About this title

Review:

"The authors provide an impressively up-to-date, thorough, and evenhanded review not only of recent work on human sexuality in relation to ovarian cycle stage, but also of relevant research on other taxa and of the latest theoretical and empirical work on sexual selection and antagonistic coevolution of the sexes. The result is a tour de force, and those who wish to refute it will have to come to grips with its forceful argumentation and impressive breadth of information."--The Quarterly Review of Biology

Synopsis:

Research conducted over the last fifteen years has placed in question many of the traditional conclusions about the evolution of human female sexuality. Women have not lost estrus, as earlier researchers thought, but it is simply concealed, resulting in two functionally distinct sexualities with markedly different ends in each phase. At the fertile phase of the cycle, women prefer male traits that may mark superior genetic quality, and at infertile phases, they prefer men willing to invest resources in a mate. Thus, women's peri-ovulatory sexuality functions to obtain a sire of superior genetic quality, and is homologous with estrus in other vertebrates. This model sheds light on male human sexuality as well: men perceive and respond to women's estrus, including by increased mate guarding. Men's response is limited, compared to other vertebrate males, implying coevolutionary history of selection on females to conceal estrus from men and selection on men to detect it. Research indicates that women's concealed estrus is an adaptation to copulate conditionally with men other than the pair-bond partner.Women's sexual ornaments-the estrogen-facilitated features of face and body-are honest signals of individual quality pertaining to future reproductive value.

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press, U.S.A.
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 019534099X
• ISBN 13: 9780195340990
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 424