Parental Investment

Sex Differences In Parental Investment

• Males can walk away from investment into childcare in ways females can't, due to their high reproductive effort that takes place during mating and courtship. (Daly + Wilson)

Why do females invest more?

• Human babies are born relatively immature, compared to other mammalian young, due to an enlargement of the skull.
• In common with other mammels, female humans breast feed their young.
• Due to the prolonged immaturity of a human infant, human females invest the most resources postnataly as well as prenataly.

Costs of maternal investment

• Male costs of maternal investment are, at the minimum, sex and semen.
• The minimum costs for females are nine moths pregnacy, followed by years of feading, carying and teaching.
• This makes random mating by females a risky and costly action.

Parental…