Document Type
Article
Publication Date
4-2016
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1086/685730
Abstract
Variability in men’s reproductive success (RS) is partly attributable to the ability of successful men to influence resource flows relevant to the mate choice and reproduction of women. This study explores the effects of variability in resource flows on men’s RS in an indigenous foraging/mixed-economy community in northern Siberia where monogamous marriage norms predominate. A series of material, embodied, and relational wealth indicators are tested as predictors of men’s age-adjusted RS and age at first birth. Material wealth related to hunting, embodied wealth as represented by hunting skill, and relational wealth as represented by numbers of kin are the most consistent predictors of men’s RS. In this monogamous population, the wives of men with more hunting capital and of men rated as better hunters have shorter interbirth intervals, and hunters show strong producer priority. These findings and ethnographic observations appear more consistent with a provisioning model than with a signaling-for-mates model.
Copyright Statement
This document was originally published in Current Anthropology by the University of Chicago Press. Copyright restrictions may apply. doi: 10.1086/685730
Publication Information
Ziker, John P.; Nolin, David A.; and Rasmussen, Joellie. (2016). "The Effects of Wealth on Male Reproduction Among Monogamous Hunter-Fisher-Trappers in Northern Siberia". Current Anthropology, 57(2), 221-229.