Female cooperation: evolutionary, cross-cultural and ethnographic evidence

Abstract

Women and girls cooperate with each other across many domains and at many scales. However, much of this information is buried in the ethnographic record and has been overlooked in theoretic constructions of the evolution of human sociality and cooperation. The assumed primacy of male bonding, hunting, patrilocality and philopatry has dominated the discussion of cooperation without balanced consideration. A closer look at the ethnographic record reveals that in addition to cooperative childcare and food production, women and girls collectively form coalitions, have their own cooperative political, ceremonial, economic and social institutions, and develop female-based exchange and support networks. The numerous ethnographic examples of female cooperation urge reconsideration of gender stereotypes and the limits of female cooperation. This review brings together theoretic, cross-cultural and cross-lifespan research on female cooperation to present a more even and empirically supported view of female sociality. Following the lead from trends in evolutionary biology and sexual selection theory, the hope going forward is that the focus shifts from rote characterizations of sex differences to highlighting sources of variation and conditions that enhance or constrain female cooperative engagement. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Cooperation among women: evolutionary and cross-cultural perspectives’.

New perspectives on the evolution of women's cooperation

“…Post-marital residence is only one facet of the socioecological context that affects women's cooperation. Kramer ([ 112 ], in this issue) argues that women's cooperation is responsive to a variety of factors, including cultural norms, life-history stage, subsistence strategy and household demography. In a similar vein, research in experimental settings indicates that women's cooperative behaviour may be more sensitive to their social partners' needs and behaviour than men's, and women may be more likely to shift social strategies depending on the costs and benefits of each scenario compared to men ([ 73 , 82 , 113 ], all in this issue).…”

“…Discussions of female cooperation in real-world settings have largely been confined to reproductive concerns—childcare and provisioning of children. However, women and girls cooperate across domains as broad-reaching as those of men and boys, including coalition formation, political, ceremonial and social institutions, and exchange and support networks ([ 112 ], in this issue). Although their participation may be less formalized than men's, the ethnographic evidence summarized by Kramer [ 112 ] suggests that we need to reconsider the notion that the scope for cooperation among women and girls is limited by reproductive constraints.…”

No strong evidence for universal gender differences in the development of cooperative behaviour across societies

“…A number of theoretical proposals have offered explanations for why prosocial behaviour should vary based on gender, although there is no consensus about the direction of the effects [28]. Empirical work with adults does little to clarify this issue because the vast majority of data come from a small number of industrialized societies (see [10]) which has limited our ability to make compelling claims about universal features of human psychology [29].…”

Sedentarization and maternal childcare networks: role of risk, gender and demography

“…Instead, those who are found to be important in terms of provisioning [ 5 ], childcare [ 6 ], child survivorship [ 7 ] and women's fertility outcomes [ 8 ] varies. While arguments of gender-based difference in social networks suggest this will be constant across socioecological contexts, it is apparent that women's social networks are flexible and respond to changes in subsistence and the environment [ 1 , 9 – 11 ]. Within a human behavioural ecology paradigm, such trends are expected as the fitness returns to cooperation—for both the mother and the allomother—will be dependent on the local socioecology [ 12 , 13 ].…”

“…Shortages in one domain, such as food provisioning, impact other household domains (e.g. domestic work and/or childcare) as time, and thus energy, are finite [ 11 , 34 ]. For instance, mothers may increase foraging efforts if foraging returns are low due to sickness in the household and thus require substitutive childcare support [ 26 ].…”