Sarah Blaffer Hrdy facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Sarah Hrdy
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Sarah Blaffer
July 11, 1946 |
| Nationality | American |
| Alma mater | Radcliffe College (BA) Harvard University (PhD) |
| Awards | Lifetime Career Award, Human Behavior and Evolution Society |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Anthropology and primatology |
| Institutions | University of California, Davis |
| Doctoral advisor | Irven DeVore |
Sarah Hrdy (born July 11, 1946) is an American scientist. She studies anthropology (the study of human societies and cultures) and primatology (the study of primates like monkeys and apes). She has greatly helped us understand how female behavior in both humans and other primates has changed over time through evolution.
Many people see Sarah Hrdy as a leader in her field. In 2013, she received a special award for her amazing work from the Human Behavior and Evolution Society. She used to be a professor at the University of California, Davis. Discover magazine also named her one of the 50 most important women in science in 2002.
Contents
About Sarah Hrdy's Life
Growing Up and School
Sarah Blaffer was born in Dallas, Texas, in 1946. She grew up in Houston. When she was 18, she went to Wellesley College. She first studied philosophy and creative writing. She even started writing a novel about Mayan culture. But she found researching the Maya more exciting than writing the story.
Later, she moved to Radcliffe College. Here, she decided to study anthropology. Her first book, The Black Man of Zincantan, came from her college research. She finished college with top honors in 1969.
Discovering Primates
Sarah Hrdy wanted to make films to help people. But a class at Stanford University changed her path. She learned about problems caused by too many people. She also heard about langurs, a type of monkey in India. Her professor, Irven DeVore, said that male langurs sometimes killed babies in their group.
This made her very curious. In 1970, she went to Harvard University to study primate behavior. She focused her PhD research on langurs in Mount Abu, India. She worked with important scientists like Robert L. Trivers and E. O. Wilson. She earned her PhD from Harvard in 1975.
Family Life
Sarah met Daniel Hrdy at Harvard. They got married in 1972 in Kathmandu. They have three children: Katrinka, Sasha, and Niko. Today, Sarah and Daniel Hrdy live in northern California. They grow walnuts and work to restore nature on their farm.
Sarah Hrdy's Career Journey
After her studies, Sarah Hrdy spent time doing research in India and working at Harvard. She taught at different universities for a few years. In 1984, she became a professor of anthropology at the University of California at Davis. She retired in 1996 but still helps with animal behavior studies there.
Key Research and Ideas
Understanding Langurs
Sarah Hrdy first learned about langur monkeys in a college class. She was very interested in their behavior. Her PhD research focused on these monkeys. In 1977, she published her findings in a book called The Langurs of Abu: Female and Male Strategies of Reproduction.
Her research showed that male langurs sometimes kill babies. This happens when new males take over a group. This behavior helps the new males have their own babies sooner. Her findings have been seen in many other animals since then.
The Woman That Never Evolved
In 1981, Hrdy wrote her third book, The Woman That Never Evolved. In this book, she looked at how female animals behave. She showed that females are not just passive. They have their own smart ways to survive and have babies. This book was named one of The New York Times' best books of 1981.
Mother Nature and Helping Parents
Her 1999 book, Mother Nature: A history of mothers, infants, and natural selection, looked at human mothers and babies. She explored how mothers balance raising children with finding food and resources. She explained that "maternal instinct" is not always automatic. It depends on the situation and the baby's needs.
Hrdy also said that human mothers need help to raise their children. She used the term "allomother" (from the Greek "allo" meaning "other than"). An allomother is anyone other than the mother who helps care for a baby. This could be a father, grandparents, older siblings, or even unrelated helpers like nannies. This idea is called "cooperative breeding." It means that a group works together to raise the young.
Mothers and Others: How We Became Social
In her 2009 book, Mothers and Others, Hrdy continued her ideas about cooperative breeding. She suggested that this shared childcare helped humans become very social. Because human babies had many caregivers, they learned to understand others' feelings and thoughts. This helped them get the best care.
Over time, babies who were better at connecting with many people survived and thrived more. This led to humans developing special abilities to understand each other. In 2014, she won an award for her work on how these social processes shaped human societies.
Because of her research, Sarah Hrdy believes that affordable child care is very important for families.
Helping Others Through Philanthropy
Sarah and Daniel Hrdy support a special program at Harvard University. It's called the Sarah and Daniel Hrdy Visiting Fellowship in Conservation Biology. This fellowship helps students study and work in biology.
Awards and Honors
- 1981, The Woman That Never Evolved named a Notable Book by The New York Times
- 1985, Elected to the California Academy of Sciences
- 1987–88, Guggenheim Fellow
- 1988, Radcliffe Graduate Society Medal
- 1990, Elected to the National Academy of Sciences
- 1992, Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
- 1999, Mother Nature named a "Best Book" by Publishers Weekly and Library Journal
- 2001, Howells Prize for Outstanding Contributions to Biological Anthropology for Mother Nature
- 2003, University of California Panunzio award
- 2007, Centennial Medal, Harvard GSAS
- 2011, Elected to the American Philosophical Society
- 2012, Staley Prize from School of Advanced Research for Mothers and Others
- 2012, Howells Prize for Mothers and Others
- 2013, Lifetime Career Award from the Human Behavior and Evolution Society
- 2014, NAS Award for Scientific Reviewing
- 2022, Elected fellow of American Association for the Advancement of Science
- 2023, Bowlby-Ainsworth Award
