Predictors of fecundability and conception waits among the Dogon of Mali

Strassmann, Beverly I.; Warner, John Harley

doi:10.1002/(sici)1096-8644(199802)105:2<167::aid-ajpa5>3.0.co;2-s

Cited by 30 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 43 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Two previous studies of the Dogon addressed the proximate mechanisms that underlie variation in female fertility and child mortality, but did not explore fitness effects (Strassmann 1997a,b;Strassmann & Warner 1998). Taken together, the three studies suggest that the quadratic relationship between fertility and reproductive success was probably caused by offspring competition for parental investment.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life–history theory, fertility and reproductive success in humans

Strassmann

Gillespie

2002

Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B

149

102

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

According to life-history theory, any organism that maximizes fitness will face a trade-off between female fertility and offspring survivorship. This trade-off has been demonstrated in a variety of species, but explicit tests in humans have found a positive linear relationship between fitness and fertility. The failure to demonstrate a maximum beyond which additional births cease to enhance fitness is potentially at odds with the view that human fertility behaviour is currently adaptive. Here we report, to our knowledge, the first clear evidence for the predicted nonlinear relationship between female fertility and reproductive success in a human population, the Dogon of Mali, West Africa. The predicted maximum reproductive success of 4.1 ± 0.3 surviving offspring was attained at a fertility of 10.5 births. Eighty-three per cent of the women achieved a lifetime fertility level (7-13 births) for which the predicted mean reproductive success was within the confidence limits (3.4 to 4.8) for reproductive success at the optimal fertility level. Child mortality, rather than fertility, was the primary determinant of fitness. Since the Dogon people are farmers, our results do not support the assumptions that: (i) contemporary foragers behave more adaptively than agriculturalists, and (ii) that adaptive fertility behaviour ceased with the Neolithic revolution some 9000 years ago. We also present a new method that avoids common biases in measures of reproductive success.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life–history theory, fertility and reproductive success in humans

Strassmann

Gillespie

2002

Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B

149

102

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…From this perspective, declining fecundity would seem to be a simple extension of menopause itself. This process, however, may be quite heterogeneous, with more fecund women reproducing to later ages [52,56], despite the fact that rates of pregnancy loss increase with age [48]. For example, among Utah women who continued to reproduce into their 40s, there was little evidence of declining fecundity with increased parity once age was controlled for [45].…”

Section: Proximate Determinants Of Age At Last Birthmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why do women stop reproducing before menopause? A life-history approach to age at last birth

Towner

Nenko

Walton

2016

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Evolutionary biologists have long considered menopause to be a fundamental puzzle in understanding human fertility behaviour, as post-menopausal women are no longer physiologically capable of direct reproduction. Menopause typically occurs between 45 and 55 years of age, but across cultures and history, women often stop reproducing many years before menopause. Unlike age at first reproduction or even birth spacing, a woman nearing the end of her reproductive cycle is able to reflect upon the offspring she already has—their numbers and phenotypic qualities, including sexes. This paper reviews demographic data on age at last birth both across and within societies, and also presents a case study of age at last birth in rural Bangladeshi women. In this Bangladeshi sample, age at last birth preceded age at menopause by an average of 11 years, with marked variation around that mean, even during a period of high fertility. Moreover, age at last birth was not strongly related to age at menopause. Our literature review and case study provide evidence that stopping behaviour needs to be more closely examined as an important part of human reproductive strategies and life-history theory. Menopause may be a final marker of permanent reproductive cessation, but it is only one piece of the evolutionary puzzle.

show abstract

“…Some research has suggested that polygyny may lower female fertility, through its effect of reducing coital frequency (Pebley & Mbugua, 1989;Hern, 1992, but see Sembajwe, 1979;Borgerhoff Mulder, 1989;Strassmann & Warner, 1998). From an evolutionary point of view, polygyny is not necessarily expected to be costly for women.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The effects of kin on female fertility in rural Gambia

Sear

Mace

McGregor

2003

Evolution and Human Behavior

118

126

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This is an electronic version of an Article published in Evolution and AbstractHuman females reproduce relatively rapidly throughout their reproductive years compared to the other great apes. It has been suggested that women are able to sustain this rapid pace by co-opting family members to help raise their children. We tested the hypothesis that the presence of kin will increase the reproductive rates of women using a longitudinal database collected from rural Gambia. We found that both the husband's mother and, to a lesser extent, the husband's father increased the probability that a woman would give birth. A woman's parents, however, had no effect on her fertility rate, nor did her elder sisters or co-wives. The presence of a woman's elder brothers even decreased her probability of giving birth. There was no evidence that elder children acted as 'helpers at the nest', as the existence of living elder children slowed down rather than increased birth rates. We suggest that the increased fertility in the presence of mothers-in-law may be due to these women helping out their daughters-in-law with domestic and subsistence duties. Given that it is paternal, rather than maternal, relatives who increase fertility, social pressures on women from older kin to bear many children may also be important.

show abstract

Predictors of fecundability and conception waits among the Dogon of Mali

Cited by 30 publications

References 43 publications

Life–history theory, fertility and reproductive success in humans

Life–history theory, fertility and reproductive success in humans

Why do women stop reproducing before menopause? A life-history approach to age at last birth

The effects of kin on female fertility in rural Gambia

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About