Cross-Cultural Research

Human mobility strategies condition the purposes for which architectural features are built and the durations of their occupation. A cross-cultural study indicates that occupation duration statistically predicts the effort invested in dwellings (as indi cated by the kinds of materials used in construction). Mobility does not predict the numberof different kinds of structures ordwellings used by a group. Human mobility does not significantly predict floor areas or wall heights of dwellings.

This paper describes a cross-cultural test of a set of hypotheses in which it is stated that the junior levirate and junior sororate are related to a particular pattern of rank ing of parallel cousins. Underlying the hypotheses is the view that, in the presence of such a pattern, senior levirate and sororate marriages will be prohibited, because they would create confusion in the ranking of siblings. The results of the test support the hypotheses.

Despite the considerable research that has been carried out on cross-cultural pat terns of political conflict, little empirical attention has been devoted to the study of blood feuds. In this study, coding categories were developed to measure the legitimacy of kin group vengeance, self-redress, and formal adjudication mechanisms among societies in the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample (Murdock and White 1969). The empirical results strongly suggest that blood feuds occur within the context of marriage bargains and that they are most characteristic of societies studied prior to World WarI. When historical time penod and other potential external influences were considered, feuding was found to be associated primarily with premarital chastity concerns and mode of marriage. Individual self-redress and formal adjudication, however, depend on characteristics of the political economy-economic resource base, stratification, diverging devolution, and hospitable climate. It is suggested here that future analyses of political conflict should distinguish feuds from other forms and take into account the historical effects of Western incursions on the internal politics of traditional communities.

A cross-cultural examination of determinants of cassava production and process ing in Africa considers such cultural variables as kinship and market involvement to complement Boserup's population density model (1965). Expert anthropologists coded societies that they had studied, and a geographic information system added information from diverse maps.

This study compared the play of Korean and American one-year-olds, to determine differences in behaviors reflective of mastery motivation. The two groups of children exhibited similar levels of mastery behavior (goal-directed exploration); however, the American children used general exploration significantly more than did the Korean children. There were significant differences as well in parental behavior during the play sessions. The two groups of parents also differed with respect both to their percep tions of their children's play and to their child-rearing attitudes.

The paper begins with a discussion of the concepts of homology and analogy and their relationship to each other and to the phenomenon of parallel outcomes in anzmal and human behavior. I then present a collection of arguments and pieces of evidence concerning the scientific value of a continuing investigation into para llelisms. Examples are given from technology, sexuality, social relationshtps, kin ship, and ethnocentnsm, and from an extensive case study of responses to strong population pressure in East Africa. A brief concluding section treats the question of whether humankind's unusual cognitive capacities are likely to create circumstances in which parallehsms are eradicated.

Some postprocessual theorists have criticized the cross-cultural approach in archaeology, arguing that it reduces cultural variability to analytical sameness and neglects the role of historical contingency in human affairs Responding to these criticisms, this paper suggests how archaeologists can be sensitive to contextual variation and the forces of history while carrying out comparative analyses of developmental sequences

This paper presents and discusses codes for the Murdock/White (1969) sample societies. The codes measure warfare frequencies (internal, external, and overall); land and nonland resources taken during war; individual and socially organized aggression (homicide, assault, theft, trespass, suicide); and unpredictable and pre dictable resource problems