Tag: Humans

  • Health

    The eyes tell

    A new study shows that gaze-following develops in monkeys in a way that’s nearly identical to humans, suggesting that the behavior has deep evolutionary roots.

  • Health

    A cost of culture

    A new study, authored by Collin McCabe, a doctoral student in Harvard’s Department of Human Evolutionary Biology, suggests that increased exposure to disease has played an important role in the evolution of culture in both humans and non-human primates.

  • Health

    Mouthful of clues

    Harvard researchers have demonstrated that the levels of barium in teeth correspond with breast-feeding. Importantly, they said, the barium levels can remain in fossils that are thousands of years old. This provides new opportunities to study breast-feeding behavior among Neanderthals and early humans.

  • Health

    Survival of the selfless

    In a talk sponsored by the Harvard Museum of Natural History, biologist E.O. Wilson said that competition among groups of humans is a likely explanation for the rise of altruistic behavior in individuals.

  • Health

    Alzheimer’s for humans only

    Disorders that result in severe neurological decline, such as Alzheimer’s disease, are not found in other animals, meaning that humans acquired their predisposition to the disease during recent evolution.

  • Health

    The deciding factor

    What, exactly, distinguishes humans from apes? It’s certainly more than just our genes, renowned anthropologist Sarah Blaffer Hrdy. Hrdy, who received her A.B. in 1969 and Ph.D. in 1975 for work in Harvard’s Department of Anthropology, returned to speak on “Mothers and Others: The Origin of Emotionally Modern Humans.”

  • Arts & Culture

    Oldest-known fibers to be used by humans discovered

    A team of archaeologists and paleobiologists has discovered flax fibers that are more than 34,000 years old, making them the oldest fibers known to have been used by humans.