182 Evolutionary Anthropology zyxwvuts Primatology: Some zyxw Lessons from and for Related Disciplines zyxwv An Introduction to zyxwvuts Animal Behaviour zyxwvutsr By Aubrey Manning, Marian S. Dawkins (1 992). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 196 pp. $69.95 (hardback), $24.95 (cloth). ISBN 0-521-41759-7. Primate Behaviour: Information, Social Knowledge, and the Evolution of Culture By Duane Quiatt, Vernon Reynolds (1 992). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 322 pp. The Inevitable Bond. Examining Scientist-Animal Interactions. By Hank Davis, Dianne Balfour (1992). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 399 pp. $75.00 (hardback). ISBN 0-521-40510-6. Measuring Behaviour. An Introductory Guide. Second Edition. By Paul Martin, Patrick Bateson (1993). Cambridge: cambridge University Press. xiv + 222 pp. $16.95 (cloth). ISBN 0-52 1-44614-7. -0logy. Fill in this blank by in- serting your favorite taxonomic sub- j e c t : entomology, herpetology, icthyology, ornithology, and, of course, primatology. What these “ologies”share is an interest in a specific set of beasts-their anatomy, phylogeny, life history, ecology, and so- cial organization. They also differ, however, in fundamental ways. Each area of specialization has its own re- searchers, who hold their own scien- tific meetings, have their own journals, and tend to use quite differ- ent observational and experimental techniques to assess the validity of their predictions and favored hy- potheses. It is also the case that such ologies are commonly associated with a breed of taxonomic chauvinism. Needless to say, such chauvinism zyxwvuts can transcend higher order taxonomic lev- els, infecting the generic, species, and even population levels. What I will ar- gue here, hoping to fuel discussion within the field, is that taxonomic chauvinism can create barriers and block scientific progress by severing theoretical ties to relevant mother dis- ciplines-in this case, behavioral ecol- ne m a t o 1 ogy, ogy, cognitive psychology, and neuro- biology. Fields that become discon- nected in this manner not only suffer from the lack of theoretically novel in- spirations from other disciplines, but fail to share their own inspirations and discoveries. Thus, I raise the caution- ary point that primatology risks be- coming disconnected from the rest of animal behavior. This would be unfor- tunate indeed, for important advances are emerging from research on other taxonomic groups, and we should take advantage of them. Of equal impor- tance, primatologists have significant theoretical and methodological con- tributions to make to other disciplines and to those studying other taxonomic groups. However, cogent arguments must be developed so that nonprima- tologists are convinced of their signifi- cance. To clarify the points I will develop, let me lay them out here in telegraphic form. 1. In contrast to a good deal of re- search on primates, that which fo- cuses on other taxonomic groups is often more question-driven than spe- cies-driven. Although it is absolutely crucial for us to accumulate data on a broad range of species, it is equally im- portant for us to recognize the theo- retical limitations of studying particular species. For those who study nonhuman primates, these limita- tions include the difficulties associated with quantifying intrapopulational variations in the fitness of long-lived species, as well as the technical and ethical constraints associated with conducting manipulative experiments (ecological and social variables). Be- cause of these and several other issues, I advocate the following research ap- proach. First, what are the primary theoretical questions that one wishes to address? Second, what primate spe- cies can provide the most informative answers to these questions, given methodological constraints such as the visibility of subjects, the ability to conduct manipulative experiments, and the need to obtain sufficient sam- ple sizes for statistical testing? 2. Because of its species-centric rather than question-centric ap- proach, primatology tends to be less connected with theoretical and meth- odological advances emerging from studies on both closely and distantly related species. Consequently,many z of us are missing a golden opportunity to make productive use of the research efforts of others, especially their meth- odological developments, and thereby directly contribute to the comparative data base. Such comparative analyses would serve to illustrate where par- ticular hypotheses fail to generalize across species. 3. Primatology has developed its own methods and theoretical predic- tions, but many of these have not been picked up by those studying other or- ganisms. Consequently, we are left with a relatively unsatisfactory com- parative data base. This is unfortunate because we cannot test the generali- ties of our findings. In other words, because observations and experi- ments on primates and nonprimates tend to use extremely different meth- ods, it is not possible to assess, for ex- ample, whether patterns of behavior across taxonomic groups differ as a re- sult of sampling techques or phyloge- netic factors-true species differences. To develop these three points, I use examples and points that emerge from the four books listed at the start of this review. PRI MATOLOGY ’S DISTANCE FROM RELATED DISCIPLINES? To illustrate the extent to which pri- matology seems to be disconnected from closely related disciplines, I will compare two recent textbooks. The first, zyxw Animal Behaviour, was written by two ethologists, A. Manning and M.S. Dawkins.‘ The second, Primate Behav- iour: Infomation, Social Knowledge, and the Evolution of zyx Culture, was writ- ten by two primatologists, D. Quiatt and V. Reynolds.2 Animd Behaviour is divided into six chapters on develop- ment, communication, motivation and decision-making, evolution, learning and memory, and social or- ganization. In their preface, Manning and Dawkins state that the “focus of the book is the organization and evo- lution of the behaviourof individuals.” No one would dispute the claim that understanding the behavior of indi- viduals is central to understanding all facets of primate behavior and evolu- tion. Yet, in reading through the 540 references in this volume, I find that