#483 Lauren Brent: The Evolution of Sociality, and Primate Societies
RECORDED ON MARCH 9th 2021.
Dr. Lauren Brent is Associate Professor in the Centre for Research in Animal Behaviour at the University of Exeter. She is a biologist interested in the evolution of sociality. Her research asks why social relationships are formed and how they are maintained. Her work focuses on highly gregarious, group-living animals. She works mostly with data collected from wild or free-ranging groups, and specialize on study systems with uniquely long-term datasets. She uses a diverse set of methods, including techniques from ethology, evolutionary biology, quantitative and functional genetics, life-history evolution, endocrinology, comparative psychology, and cognitive neuroscience.
In this episode, we talk about the evolution of sociality. We first ask what sociality is. We then go through topics like: individual variation in how animals establish social relations; what social complexity is; the importance and benefits of social connections; how kin selection and reciprocal altruism influence social organization; indirect connections; friendships; how prolonged life after reproduction evolved; a case study from 2012 about how rhesus macaques reacted to a group member that died of a fatal attack; and neuroethology.
Time Links:
Intro
What is sociality?
Individual variation
Social complexity
Social connections and their benefits
Kin selection and reciprocal altruism
Indirect connections
Friendships
Prolonged after reproduction
Rhesus macaques reacting to death
Neuroethology
Follow Dr. Brent’s work!
Follow Dr. Brent’s work:
Faculty page: https://bit.ly/3n31gkD
Website: https://bit.ly/35069EH
ResearchGate profile: https://bit.ly/3kX4uXc
Twitter handle: @ljnbrent