Juvenile Primates: Life History, Development, and Behavior

What is a juvenile? Why do primates take so long to grow up? What forces shape the behavior of juvenile primates, and how do experiences during these early years influence life as an adult? Juvenile Primates is the first book to focus specifically on the primate juvenile period. Using a life-history approach, contributors to this volume consider the paradoxes inherent in the unusually long juvenile process exhibited by primates as they present new data on the challenges faced by juveniles across a broad range of species. Individual chapters focus on prosimians, Old and New World monkeys, apes, and humans, and topics include the development of sex differences, meeting needs for safety, establishing and maintaining social relationships, managing social conflict, and developing skills for adult life. The book concludes with a look at children and how cross-cultural differences in physical and behavioral development can be understood in terms of evolutionary theory. The result is a landmark in primate studies, one that shows how understanding juvenile development yields insight into entire life histories. The book will be of interest to anthropologists, biologists, primatologists, and psychologists.

Michael E. Pereira is at Duke University Primate Center. Lynn A. Fairbanks is at University of California at Los Angeles.