Sex and Friendship in Baboons

"This book is a thoughtful and thought-provoking presentation of Smuts's fieldwork on the enduring preferential relationships between certain adult male and female baboons, relationships that persist irrespective of the female's reproductive state and that are both quantitatively and qualitatively different from other male-female associations... This is a well-balanced meeting of ethnography and evolutionary biology, illustrated with vignettes that capture the flavor of baboon social life." - Amy Samuels, The Quarterly Review of Biology "This book is a remarkable achievement, and may well be a landmark... on how to do a field study, how to analyse field data, and how to write up the results. The strength of the book is in its close attention to a single group of primates, which, coupled with considerable methodological rigour both at the observational and analytical stages, has led to the discovery of statistically valid findings." - V. Reynolds, Man "Barbara Smuts adds to the growing storehouse of information on baboons, as well as to the growing awareness of the sophisticated (read "humanlike") way primates run their lives... The strength of Smuts's study is the documentation of subtle but important interactions among some age-sex classes in baboon societies." - Adrienne L. Zihlman, American Anthropologist "Even though... years have passed since Smuts's book was published, it remains the standard reference for the study of male-female social interactions among primates. Part of the reason her book stays fresh is that Smuts deftly combines the presentation of her data on baboon social life with a primer on how to conduct a scientific study of primate behavior. She provides skillful guidance regarding how to devise and test a hypothesis and how to collect, analyze, interpret, and present data in an interesting and accessible way. Sex and Friendship in Baboons should be required reading." - Nichelle L. Cobb, Current Anthropology "I first read this book as a graduate student in the late 1980s... This book accomplishes an additional goal described in the new 1999 preface. Smuts states that it is important that we come to understand the highly personal nature of baboon (and other species') relationships. In doing so, not only may we understand ourselves better, but we may also come to view o ur responsibilities toward baboons and other species in a different way. Smuts's work brings the personal side of baboon life to light while maintaining a professional and scientific approach to the topic... Sex and Friendship in Baboons still provides marvelous insight into olive baboon social life." - Vicki K. Bentley-Condit, Quarterly Review of Biology "[A] detailed case study in primate behavior which could easily be used as a methods manual for students about how to embark on their own projects." - Linda Marie Fedigan, American Scientist "The fieldwork combined systematic observation with the careful recording and enumeration of data... A number of carefully documented chapters analyze the benefits and costs of friendships to both males and females... This excellent study has a great deal to offer." - Jetse Sprey, Contemporary Sociology