Abstract
Father absence in early life has been shown to be associated with accelerated reproductive development in girls. Evolutionary social scientists have proposed several adaptive hypotheses for this finding. Though there is variation in the detail of these hypotheses, they all assume that family environment in early life influences the development of life-history strategy, and, broadly, that early reproductive development is an adaptive response to father absence. Empirical evidence to support these hypotheses, however, has been derived from WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich and Democratic) populations. Data from a much broader range of human societies are necessary in order to properly test adaptive hypotheses. Here, we review the empirical literature on father absence and puberty in both sexes, focusing on recent studies that have tested this association beyond the WEIRD world. We find that relationships between father absence and age at puberty are more varied in contexts beyond WEIRD societies, and when relationships beyond the father-daughter dyad are considered. This has implications for our understanding of how early-life environment is linked to life-history strategies, and for our understanding of pathways to adult health outcomes, given that early reproductive development may be linked to negative health outcomes in later life. This article is part of the theme issue 'Developing differences: early-life effects and evolutionary medicine'.
Document Type
Journal Article
ISSN
1471-2970
Volume
374
Issue
1770
Funding Information
This study was funded by Edith Cowan University (Visiting Fellow and Capability Enhancement Grants) and the European Research Council (StG-2010 263760-FAMMAT).
PubMed ID
30966893
School
School of Medical and Health Sciences
RAS ID
28353
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Publisher
Royal Society of London
Comments
Sear, R., Sheppard, P., & Coall, D. A. (2019). Cross-cultural evidence does not support universal acceleration of puberty in father-absent households. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 374(1770), Article 20180124. Available here