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Remember we are calling monogamy The case of a person who is bound by only one spouse. For some animal species, a male is said to live with only one female at a time, at least while raising her young.

According to one literary magazine Published in 2019, monogamy is generally found in primate species that have little difference in size between males and females. This is called sexual dimorphism. The reason is that in a polygamous system, males have to make their way to conquer females and take advantage of being stronger and bigger. In humans, males are 15% larger and heavier than females, while in gorillas and orangutans, males can easily weigh twice as much as their concubines.

The emergence of co-parenting

Monogamy will be Also the most supportive home environment To ensure the survival of the descendants of our species. Childrensane man They are born very dependent on their parents and require a lot of care compared to other species, in order to get children to reach maturity and develop the full potential of gray matter.

So the parents had an advantage, from a purely biological or evolutionary point of view, in cooperation: because the woman must devote a great deal of energy to this task and is not ready to reproduce again for long. This is how it will be for parents somehow Joined efforts with mothers. In addition to cooperation, this provided an additional degree of protection for their offspring.

However, studies over time have suggested that it is monogamy that creates a favorable context for the emergence of paternal care, and not the other way around. L ‘One of the hypothesesmentioned in 2016 in the review temper nature, who attempts to explain what underpinned the evolution of the monogamous lifestyle, is that when there are fewer males than males in a society, they tend to be associated with one female. This ensures the bond of paternity towards her young.

Biologists and anthropologists see it as a form of natural selection at work: this way of life in favor of the offspring of the group, would gradually have led to a greater closeness of the fathers and, eventually, to an intensification of paternal care.

Rule

Although it is impossible to know everything that happened in the past few million years, studies, especially those comparing humans to their primate cousins, indicate that our ancestors evolved towards a monogamous lifestyle to provide a safe environment for their offspring and facilitate the survival of their offspring.

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