The authors argue that sexual equality may have proved an evolutionary advantage for early human societies, as it would have fostered wider-ranging social networks and closer cooperation between unrelated individuals. “It gives you a far more expansive social network with a wider choice of mates, so inbreeding would be less of an issue,”

“Chimpanzees live in quite aggressive, male-dominated societies with clear hierarchies,” he said. “As a result, they just don’t see enough adults in their lifetime for technologies to be sustained.”

illu45:

Link to the actual study (Full text requires free registration, but abstract is viewable without it).

This is neat, but worth noting that it seems to be based purely on mathematical modelling, rather than any actual archaeological evidence, so the study's title of "Sex equality can explain the unique social structure of hunter-gatherer bands" (emphasis added) seems like a more apt title than the Guardian headline (which is pretty much par for the course when it comes to Science reporting, sadly).

posted 2898 days ago