The Evolutionary Biology of Human Female Sexuality - Hardcover

Thornhill, Randy; Gangestad, Steven W.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0195340981 ISBN 13: 9780195340983

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2008

Synopsis

Research conducted in the last fifteen years has placed in question many of the traditional conclusions scholars have formed about human female sexuality. Though conventional wisdom asserts that womens estrus has been evolutionarily lost, Randy Thornhill and Steven W. Gangestad assert that it is present, though concealed. Women, they propose, therefore exhibit two sexualities each ovulatory cycleestrus and sexuality outside of the estrous phase, extended sexualitythat possess distinct functions. Synthesizing research in behavioral evolution and comparative biology, the authors provide a new theoretical framework for understanding the evolution of human female sexuality, one that is rooted in female sexuality and phylogeny across all vertebrate animals.

About this title

About the Author:

Randy Thornhill is Distinguished Professor of Biology at the University of New Mexico.
Steven W. Gangestad is Distinguished Professor of Psychology at the University of New Mexico.

Review:

"The authors provide an impressively up-to-date, thorough, and evenhanded review not only of recent work on human sexuality in relation to ovarian cycle stage, but also of relevant research on other taxa and of the latest theoretical and empirical work on sexual selection and antagonistic coevolution of the sexes. The result is a tour de force, and those who wish to refute it will have to come to grips with its forceful argumentation and impressive breadth of information."--The Quarterly Review of Biology

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0195340981
• ISBN 13: 9780195340983
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 424