Costly and Cute: Helpless Infants and Human Evolution

Description

Scholars have long argued that the developmental state of the human infant at birth is unique. This volume expands that argument, pointing out that many distinctively human characteristics can be traced to the fact that we give birth to infants who are highly dependent on others and who learn how to be human while their brains are experiencing growth unlike that seen in other primates. The contributors to this volume propose that the “helpless infant” has played a role in human evolution equal in importance to those of “man the hunter” and “woman the gatherer.” The authors take a broad look at how human infants are similar to and different from the infants of other species, at how our babies have constrained our evolution over the past six million years, and at how they continue to shape the ways we live today. Front Cover SAR Series Page Title Page Copyright Contents List of Illustrations 1: Human Evolution and the Helpless Infant / Wenda R. Trevathan and Karen R. Rosenberg 2: The Obstetrical Dilemma Unraveled / Holly M. Dunsworth 3: Primate Birth at the Extremes: Exploring Obstetric and Metabolic Constraints / Marcia Ponce de León and Christoph P. E. Zollikofer 4: Brains, Birth, Bipedalism, and the Mosaic Evolution of the Helpless Human Infant / Jeremy M. DeSilva 5: Infancy by Design: Maternal Metabolism, Hormonal Signals, and the Active Management of Infant Growth by Human Milk / E. A. Quinn 6: Baby the Trendsetter: Three Evo-Devo Trends and Their Expressionin Asperger Syndrome / Dean Falk 7: Plastic and Heterogeneous: Postnatal Developmental Changes in the Human Brain / Katerina Semendeferi and Kari L. Hanson 8: Testosterone, Fatherhood, and Social Networks / Lee T. Gettler 9: Of Marmosets, Men, and the Transformative Power of Babies / Sarah B. Hrdy 10: Forget Ye Not the Mother-Infant Dyad!: In a World of Allomothers and Maternal Agency, Do Mothers Still Stand Out? / James J. McKenna Bibliography Contributors Index Back Cover