Childhood Experiences with Family Pets and Internalizing Symptoms in Early Adulthood

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether childhood experiences with family pets are associated with symptoms of depression and anxiety in early adulthood. Undergraduate students (n=318) responded to an online survey that included questions about bonding with childhood pets, exposure to family violence and human aggression directed toward family pets in childhood, and current symptoms of depression and anxiety. Two-way ANCOVAs were conducted with a measure of childhood emotional abuse included as a covariate, and significant interactions were observed between pet bonding and exposure to aggression toward pets (pet aggression). Among participants with medium-level bonds, those who were exposed to pet aggression had significantly higher depression and anxiety scores than those who were not exposed to pet aggression. Among participants who were not exposed to pet aggression, those with medium-level bonds had lower depression and anxiety scores than those with low-level bonds. Bearing in mind the limitations of the research design, the results are consistent with the assertion that bonding with pets may support mental health and that exposure to animal cruelty may lead to the development of internalizing symptoms. The results also support the contention that both bonding with pets and exposure to pet aggression should be considered when investigating the association between experiences with pets and mental health. Interventions for the protection of children may be indicated in cases of animal cruelty. Social workers who investigate child maltreatment may be advised to refer children who are exposed to animal cruelty for counseling. Clinicians should consider addressing issues that arise from exposure to pet aggression during the therapeutic process.     

Strength determines coalitional strategies in humans

Coalitions enhance survival and reproductive success in many social species, yet they generate contradictory impulses. Whereas a coalition increases the probability of successfully obtaining rewards for its members, it typically requires a division of rewards among members, thereby diminishing individual benefits. Non-human primate data indicate that coalition formation is more likely when an individual''s probability of success is low when competing alone. No comparable studies exist for humans. Here we show using a computerized competitive game that humans exhibit a systematic, intuitive strategy for coalition formation based on their own and others'' levels of perceived strength, a pattern that resembles coalition formation in chimpanzees, Pan troglodytes. Despite equal expected pay-offs for all strategies, subjects were more likely to form coalitions as their own level of perceived strength waned. Those chosen as coalition partners tended to be stronger individuals or arbitrarily designated ‘friends’. Results suggest a heuristic for human coalitionary decisions that rests on the perception of relative power rather than on the assessment of pay-offs.     

Evolutionary Perspectives on Human Aggression

The papers in this volume present varying approaches to human aggression, each from an evolutionary perspective. The evolutionary studies of aggression collected here all pursue aspects of patterns of response to environmental circumstances and consider explicitly how those circumstances shape the costs and benefits of behaving aggressively. All the authors understand various aspects of aggression as evolved adaptations but none believe that this implies we are doomed to continued violence, but rather that variation in aggression has evolutionary roots. These papers reveal several similarities between human and nonhuman aggression, including our response to physical strength as an indicator of fighting ability, testosterone response to competition, a sensitivity to paternity, and baseline features of intergroup aggression in foragers and chimps. There is also one paper tackling the phylogeny of these traits. The many differences between human and nonhuman aggression are also pursued here. Topics here include the impact of modern weapons and extremes of wealth and power on both the costs and benefits of fighting, and the scale to which coercion can promote aggression that acts against a fighter’s own interests. Also the implications of large-scale human sociality are discussed.     

A New Initiative to Use Carbon Trading for Tropical Forest Conservation

I describe a new initiative, led by a coalition of developing nations, to devise a viable mechanism for using carbon trading to protect old-growth tropical forests. I highlight some of the practical and political hurdles involved in forest-carbon trading, and explain why this initiative is rapidly gaining broad-based political support.     

Neurobiology and the development of violence: common assumptions and controversies

This paper addresses four common assumptions and related controversies regarding neurobiological factors explaining violence: (i) scholars often assume stability of individual differences in neurobiological factors pertaining to violence, yet much change occurs in aggression/violence during the life course, (ii) individual differences in aggression/violence reflect one or more underlying mechanisms that are believed to have neurobiological origins, yet there is little agreement about which underlying mechanisms apply best, (iii) the development of aggression/violence to some degree can be explained by social, individual, economic and environmental factors, yet it is unclear to what extent neurobiological factors can explain the escalation to, and desistance from, violence over and above social, individual, economic and environmental factors, and (iv) violence waxes and wanes in society over time, yet the explanation of secular differences in violence by means of neurobiological and other factors is not clear. Longitudinal analyses from the Pittsburgh Youth Study are used to illustrate several of these issues.     

Embodiment of Terror: Gendered Violence in Peacetime and Wartime in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina

Gendered violence is not a special type of torture used only in war. Its roots are well established in peacetime. This article discusses parallels between the patterns of everyday domination and aggression during times of peace and war. Further, it discusses how metaphors and acts of rape in peacetime are transformed into symbols and acts of rape for wartime purposes. During peacetime the individual body, especially its essences —sexuality and reproduction—becomes the symbol of everyday domination and aggression. Wartime transforms individual bodies into social bodies as seen, for example, in genocidal rapes or ethnic cleansing, which are thought to purify the bloodlines. Then, institutions—that is, medical, religious, and government establishments—further reinforce the wartime process by manipulating the individual/social body into the body politic by controlling and defining "human life" and using political rapes to entice military action by the West. The final transformation (at the war's conclusion) is the reformation of the social body back into the individual body, making the individual body once again the focus of dominance and aggression as the acceptable social "order." [war rapes, gender, body folklore, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina]     

Linking Behavior and Community Ecology: Interspecific Aggression Provides Evidence for Competition Between a Migrant and Resident Warbler

Intraspecific aggression is known to be an important behavior structuring bird communities, but interspecific aggression has been studied less frequently. Because of a high degree of similarity in foraging niches, I hypothesized that American redstarts (Setophaga ruticilla) and Adelaide's warblers (S. adelaidae) would interact aggressively during the non‐breeding season in southwest Puerto Rico. I used a crossover experiment to determine whether these species were aggressive to heterospecifics, presenting decoys and vocalizations of these two species, along with a control, to individuals and observing their vocal and physical responses. However, the study used only a single playback and decoy for each species, limiting the generality of the conclusions. Both species responded aggressively to decoys of conspecifics and heterospecifics, while no individual responded to the control. Responses to conspecifics were stronger than responses to heterospecifics as hypothesized, although the differences were significant only in Adelaide's warblers. The interspecific aggression observed in this study, combined with previous studies showing a high degree of overlap in space use and foraging niches and probable food limitation, strongly suggests that these species are competing for food during the non‐breeding season.     

Working for the Forest: The Ambivalent Intimacies of Human–Elephant Collaboration in South Indian Wildlife Conservation

This paper explores the collaboration of humans and elephants in South Indian wildlife conservation. Drawing on ethnography within the Indian forest department and among elephant handlers in Wayanad, Kerala, it highlights the largely invisible work relationship between indigenous forest labourers and captive elephants, and their essential contribution to wildlife management. Extending ethnographic attention beyond an exclusively human realm, I show that human and elephant relations have been co-constituted while working together for the forest department. Their working partnership, situated in the historical nature-cultures of logging, teak extraction, and conservation, has created ambivalent intimacies between humans and elephants, containing both mutual violence and affect. By highlighting the importance of work relationships, history, and questions of power for multi-species studies, this article argues that human–animal relations are not only shaped by individual intimacies, but also by danger, risk, and aggression, situated within a region's larger political ecology.     

Political competition,relative deprivation,and perceived threat: a research note on anti-Christian violence in India

A preliminary subnational statistical analysis of violence against Christians in contemporary India, this article suggests that whereas the data provide very little support for simple, demographic explanations of this violence, they do more robustly support theories emphasizing the relative status of ethnic and religious minorities (vis-à-vis majorities) and the perception, among Hindus, that Christians (and other minorities) represent a threat to their numerical, political and economic strength.     

Dowry and Public Policy in Contemporary India

In modern Indian political discourse the custom of dowry is often represented as the cause of serious social problems, including the neglect of daughters, sex-selective abortion, female infanticide, and the harassment, abuse, and murder of brides. Attempts to deal with these problems through legislative prohibition of dowry, however, have resulted in virtually no diminution of either dowry or violence against women. In contrast, radically different interpretations of dowry can be found in the literatures of structural-functionalist anthropology, economics, and human behavioral ecology which muster wide-ranging forms of qualitative and quantitative evidence to support functional models of dowry as a form of inheritance or investment in daughters and/or their children. This paper argues that a functionalist perspective on dowry could lead to improved dowry policy, and that an approach based in human behavioral ecology (HBE) is uniquely suited to this task. After reviewing the relevant literature on dowry in South Asia, I discuss current dowry legislation and its limitations. I then develop a behavioral ecology model of Indian dowry and test it with quantitative and qualitative data. I conclude that if dowry legislation is to achieve broad support or bring about effective social change, it must address and support the positive motivations for and effects of dowry and take a targeted approach to dowry violence, which is not uniformly distributed across regions, castes, or social classes.     

Experimentally increased social competition compromises humoral immune responses in house finches

Although social behavior can substantially influence an individual's physiology, few studies have examined whether intraspecific competition compromises individual immunocompetence. We experimentally manipulated the intensity of social competition in captive non-breeding house finches (Carpodacus mexicanus) by supplying few (high competition) or many (low competition) feeding sites. We tested whether elevated levels of social competition caused individual changes in aggression rates, humoral immunity, body mass, and baseline and stress-induced corticosterone concentrations. We also examined whether physiological responses to social competition were related to an individual's social status. We found that house finches under high social competition had significantly higher aggression rates, lower antibody responses, and lost more body mass. Within flocks, dominant individuals mounted stronger immune responses in both competition treatments. Our statistical power to detect differences in circulating corticosterone concentrations was low, but we did not find any support for the hypothesis that corticosterone concentrations mediate immunosuppression among or within flocks: baseline and stress-induced corticosterone concentrations did not differ under high and low social competition, were unrelated to individual social status, and did not predict the extent of immunosuppression among individuals. Overall, we documented that two universal components of social behavior, intraspecific competition and social status, modulated the strength of a humoral immune response in house finches.     

When Silence Becomes Law: Moral Constructions of the Violent Individual

Western law constructs the individual as an agent who can assume responsibility for action independently of context, thus creating an accessible place for hiding systemic political violence. This article considers how individual surrogates of political violence who silence the messages of a Oaxacan assassination emerge from reflexivity as a self-discipline that creates individual agency, law's notion of individual responsibility, and the personalizing processes of bodily violence. Thirty-two years after the assassination, its ethnographer confronts unwelcome knowledge revealed when the silence is broken. Reexamination of his own experiences the night of the murder uncovers ideological levers through which those who become the ‘individuals’ of events are led to detach their behaviors from experience to accept legal constructions of societal relationships.     

The relation between mate value, entitlement, physical aggression, size and strength among a sample of young Indian men

This study extends previous ones showing a link between direct aggression and size and strength among young men, which were informed by the evolutionary concept of resource holding power (RHP), using measures of size, strength, flexed bicep circumference and hand grip strength among a sample of young men from the Indian state of Mizoram. The study also examined the relation of these variables to reactive and proactive aggression, to entitlement to resources (related to the threatened egotism theory of aggression) and mate value (central to a modular theory of self-esteem and more broadly to sexual selection). The findings showed only a weak association between size and strength and direct aggression, which was also significantly correlated with entitlement and mate value, as predicted. Mate value also showed some association with size and strength. Reactive but not proactive aggression was linked with entitlement, but neither was associated with size or strength. In a regression analysis, controlling for age, mate value was the strongest predictor of direct aggression, but both weight (highly correlated with strength) and entitlement were marginally significant predictors independent of mate value. The findings provide support for the view that young males who view themselves as more attractive to women are more aggressive, independently of the impact on aggressiveness of RHP or entitlement to resources.     

Reproductive interests and dimensions of political ideology

Issues that relate to sex and reproduction are among the most hotly debated topics in modern politics, and a number of recent studies have sought to identify the relationship between sexual views and political ideology. In general, studies report that liberals have more permissive sexual views. Combining insights from political science about the dimensionality of political ideology with insights from evolutionary psychology about individual differences in sexual strategies, I argue and demonstrates that the association between permissive sexual views and liberalism masks a more complex set of associations. Individuals with an unrestricted sociosexual orientation are indeed more liberal on issues about authorities (as measured by Right‐Wing Authoritarianism) but are, at the same time, more conservative when it comes to views about dominance and hierarchies (as measured by Social Dominance Orientation). These findings enlighten recent debates about the nature of self‐interest in the formation of political views.     

Inbred and furious: negative association between aggression and genetic diversity in highly inbred fish

Aggressive behaviour plays an important role in securing resources, defending against predators and shaping social interactions. Although aggression can have positive effects on growth and reproductive success, it is also energetically costly and may increase injury and compromise survival. Individual genetic diversity has been positively associated with aggression, but the cause for such an association is not clear, and it might be related to the ability to recognize kin. To disentangle the relationships between genetic diversity, kinship and aggression, we quantified aggressive behaviour in a wild, self‐fertilizing fish (Kryptolebias marmoratus) with naturally variable degrees of genetic diversity, relatedness and familiarity. We found that in contrast to captive fish, levels of aggression among wild K. marmoratus are positively associated with individual homozygosity, but not with relatedness or familiarity. We suggest that the higher aggression shown by homozygous fish could be related to better kin discrimination and may be facilitated by hermaphrodite competition for scarce males, given the fitness advantages provided by outcrossing in terms of parasite resistance. It seems likely that the relationship between aggression and genetic diversity is largely influenced by both the environment and population history.     

Dead Certain

Evolutionary psychologists have suggested that confidence and conservatism promoted aggression in our ancestral past, and that this may have been an adaptive strategy given the prevailing costs and benefits of conflict. However, in modern environments, where the costs and benefits of conflict can be very different owing to the involvement of mass armies, sophisticated technology, and remote leadership, evolved tendencies toward high levels of confidence and conservatism may continue to be a contributory cause of aggression despite leading to greater costs and fewer benefits. The purpose of this paper is to test whether confidence and conservatism are indeed associated with greater levels of aggression—in an explicitly political domain. We present the results of an experiment examining people’s levels of aggression in response to hypothetical international crises (a hostage crisis, a counter-insurgency campaign, and a coup). Levels of aggression (which range from concession to negotiation to military attack) were significantly predicted by subjects’ (1) confidence that their chosen policy would succeed, (2) score on a liberal-conservative scale, (3) political party affiliation, and (4) preference for the use of military force in real-world U.S. policy toward Iraq and Iran. We discuss the possible adaptive and maladaptive implications of confidence and conservatism for the prospects of war and peace in the modern world.     

Terror Warfare and the Medicine of Peace

Terror warfare's goal is to defeat political opposition by controlling populations through the fear of brutality. Mozambique's 1976–92 war stands as a prime example of this military strategy: over one million people, the vast majority of whom were civilians, were killed. Half of these casualties were children. Fully one-half of the population was directly affected by the war, and one-quarter had to flee their homes. As devastating as terror warfare is, it is destined to fail. People ultimately resist, and they do so in complex and creative ways. Rebuilding war-destroyed worlds, healing the wounds of violence, and crafting concepts of self-identity based on resistance to aggression become powerful conflict-resolution strategies among the average citizenry. The creative resources that Mozambicans developed to survive and end a very brutal war are among the most sophisticated I have seen anywhere in the world. Their war was against violence itself. [War, healing, creativity, conflict resolution, Mozambique]     

Human collective aggression: A behavioral ecology perspective

Moller (1967/68) proposes that the presence of a large number of adolescents and young adults in a population is a precursor of violent conflicts. But acts of collective aggression are typically perpetrated by males, particularly young males between 15 and 30 years of age. This marked sex difference in the degree of participation is found in all human societies, and it has persisted since the beginning of recorded history. Sexually dimorphic behaviors are invariably found in the context of reproduction, and we discuss male coalitional aggression as a reproductive fitness-enhancing social behavior. This type of social behavior may not increase the welfare of an entire population but it is likely to promote the fitness of the coalition participants. This study argues that the age composition of the male population should be regarded as the critical ecological/demographic factor affecting a population's tendency toward peace or violent conflicts. Our analyses of interstate and intrastate episodes of collective aggression since the 1960s indicate the existence of a consistent correlation between the ratio of males 15 to 29 years of age per 100 males 30 years of age and older, and the level of coalitional aggression as measured by the number of reported conflict related deaths.     

Medical Humanitarianism Under Atmospheric Violence: Health Professionals in the 2013 Gezi Protests in Turkey

During the 2013 Gezi protests in Turkey, volunteering health professionals provided on-site medical assistance to protesters faced with police violence characterized by the extensive use of riot control agents. This led to a government crackdown on the medical community and the criminalization of “unauthorized” first aid amidst international criticisms over violations of medical neutrality. Drawing from ethnographic observations, in-depth interviews with health care professionals, and archival research, this article ethnographically analyzes the polarized encounter between the Turkish government and medical professionals aligned with social protest. I demonstrate how the context of “atmospheric violence”—the extensive use of riot control agents like tear gas—brings about new politico-ethical spaces and dilemmas for healthcare professionals. I then analyze how Turkish health professionals framed their provision of health services to protestors in the language of medical humanitarianism, and how the state dismissed their claims to humanitarian neutrality by criminalizing emergency care. Exploring the vexed role that health workers and medical organizations played in the Gezi protests and the consequent political contestations over doctors’ ethical, professional, and political responsibilities, this article examines challenges to medical humanitarianism and neutrality at times of social protest in and beyond the Middle East.     

Public Reason and the Limits of Liberal Anti-Racism in Latvia

My paper is a critical analysis of anti-racist and tolerance promotion initiatives in Latvia. First, I trace the historical and geopolitical conditions that enable the emergence of two discursive positions that are central to arguments about racism – that of liberally inclined tolerance activists and that of Latvians with politically objectionable nationalist sensibilities. Subsequently, I argue that, plagued by developmentalist thinking, anti-racist and tolerance promotion initiatives fail in their analysis of contemporary racism. They posit backward attitudes as the main hindrance to the eradication of racism and displace racism as a constitutive feature of modern political forms onto individual and collective sensibilities. Instead of the fast track diagnosis of racism that animates liberal anti-racism, I suggest that an analysis of racism should integrate attention to the common elements of modern racism across political regimes and the historical particularities that shape public and political subjectivities in concrete places.