Definition
An influential anthropologist working across multiple disciplines to contribute to our evolutionary understanding of female human and nonhuman primate behavior. Author of The Woman That Never Evolved; Mother Nature: A History of Mothers, Infants and Natural Selection; and Mother and Others: The Evolutionary Origins of Mutual Understanding.
Introduction
Sarah Blaffer Hrdy is a leading evolutionary anthropologist and primatologist who has significantly influenced numerous disciplines including evolutionary psychology, evolutionary biology, anthropology, primatology, developmental psychology, and women’s studies. Her groundbreaking theorizing is based on systematic observations, comparative studies, historical documentation, and people’s lived experiences, such that it bridges traditional disciplinary boundaries. Her work spans many topics that collectively remind scholars that individual fitness is key when understanding behavior. She is an award-winning scholar; her most...
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
References
Bateman, A. J. (1948). Intra-sexual selection in drosophila. Heredity, 2, 349–368.
Borries, C., Launhardt, K., Epplen, C., Epplen, J. T., & Winkler, P. (1999). DNA analyses support the hypothesis that infanticide is adaptive in langur monkeys. Proceedings of the Royal Society, Series B: Biological Sciences, 266, 901-904. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.1999.0721.
Citrona Farms. (2020). Sarah B. Hrdy, Anthropologist. Retrieved 19 Feb 2020 from http://www.citrona.com/hrdy
Darwin, C. (1871). The descent of man and selection in relation to sex. New York: D. Appleton and Co..
Fisher, M. L. (2017). The Oxford handbook of women and competition. New York: Oxford University Press.
Fisher, M. L., & Burch, R. (in press). Gender and evolutionary psychology. In T. K. Shackelford, Oxford Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology. New York: Oxford University Press.
Hausfater, G., & Hrdy, S. B. (1984, republished 2008; Eds.). Infanticide: Comparative and evolutionary perspectives. Chicago: Aldine de Gruyter.
Howells Prize (2020). Prize description. Retrieved 18 Feb 2020 from http://www.bas.americananthro.org/award
Hrdy, S. B. (1972). The Black-man of Zinacantan: A Central American legend. Austin: University of Texas Press.
Hrdy, S. B. (1974). Male-male competition and infanticide among the langurs (Presbytis entellus) of Abu, Rajasthan. Folia Primatologica, 22(1), 19–58.
Hrdy, S. B. (1977). Infanticide as a primate reproductive strategy. American Scientist, 65, 40–49.
Hrdy, S. B. (1980). The langurs of Abu: Female and male strategies of reproduction. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Hrdy, S. B. (1981). The woman that never evolved. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Hrdy, S. B. (1986). Empathy, polyandry, and the myth of the coy female. In R. Bleier (Ed.), Feminist approaches to science (pp. 119–146). New York: Pergamon Press.
Hrdy, S. B. (1999). Mother nature: A history of mothers, infants and natural selection. New York: Pantheon Books.
Hrdy, S. B. (2009). Mothers and others: The evolutionary origins of mutual understanding. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Johnson, E. M. (2012). Raising Darwin’s consciousness: An interview with Sarah Blaffer Hrdy on Mother Nature. The primate diaries. Retrieved 18 Feb 2020. https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/primate-diaries/raising-darwins-consciousness-an-interview-with-sarah-blaffer-hrdy-on-mother-nature/
National Academy of Science (2014). Sarah B. Hrdy award certificate. Citation and reception speech can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=At9ypyIDPAc&feature=youtu.be. Retrieved 12 Feb 2020.
Pridmore-Brown, M. (2009 May 22). Mothers without others. The Times Literary Supplement, 5538.
Rees, A. (2009). The infanticide controversy: Primatology and the art of field science. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Sridhar, H. (2016). Revisiting Hrdy 1974. Retrieved 12 Feb 2020 from https://reflectionsonpaperspast.wordpress.com/2018/01/02/revisiting-hrdy-1974/
J. I. Staley Prize (2020). Prize description. Retrieved 18 Feb 2020 from https://sarweb.org/awards/j-i-staley-prize/
Taylor, S. E., Klein, L. C., Lewis, B. P., Gruenewald, T. L., Gurung, R. A. R., & Updegraff, J. A. (2000). Biobehavioral responses to stress in females: Tend-and-befriend, not fight-or-flight. Psychological Review, 107(3), 411–429.
Trivers, R. L. (1971). The evolution of reciprocal altruism. The Quarterly Review of Biology, 46(1), 35–57.
Trivers, R. L. (1972). Parental investment and sexual selection. In B. Campbell (Ed.), Sexual selection and the descent of man, 1871–1971 (pp. 136–179). Chicago: Aldine de Gruyter.
Trivers, R. L. (1974). Parent-offspring conflict. American Zoologist, 14(1), 249–264.
van Schaik, C., & Silk, J. B. (2013). Contributions of Sarah Blaffer Hrdy. Evolutionary Anthropology, 22, 220–201.
Volk, A. A., & Atkinson, J. A. (2013). Infant and child death in the human environment of evolutionary adaptation. Evolution and Human Behavior, 34(3), 182–192.
Wilson, E. O. (1971). The insect societies. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, Imprint of Harvard University Press.
Wilson, E. O. (1975). Sociobiology: The new synthesis. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Section Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2021 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this entry
Cite this entry
Fisher, M.L. (2021). Sarah Blaffer Hrdy. In: Shackelford, T.K., Weekes-Shackelford, V.A. (eds) Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-19650-3_3180
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-19650-3_3180
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-19649-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-19650-3
eBook Packages: Behavioral Science and PsychologyReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences