Richard G Co

Biographic Data

ID181472
NAMERichard G Co
GIVEN NAMESRichard G
FAMILY NAMECo
SIGNATURECO R G
AFFILIATIONSUniversity of California, Davis
ORCID0000-0002-7981-8862
VERIFIEDYes
TOTAL WORKS24
TOTAL CITATIONS6
WORKS AS AUTHOR24
WORKS AS EDITOR0
FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR1968
LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR2025
H-INDEX2

  • Sex Differences in Children's Motivation and Action Patterns for Climbing as Behavioral Relicts of Ancestral Sexual-Size Dimorphism

    Open AccessRichard G Co, Victor K Geisler et al.ARTICLEEvolutionary Psychology2025References: 119

    Four studies investigated sex differences in children's motivation and action patterns for climbing playground structures and a gymnasium rock wall to assess any influence of ancestral sexual-size dimorphism limiting tree-climbing agility. Study 1 examined yearly incidences of children aged 3 to 13 falling from monkey bars and jungle gyms in a 1985–1989 National Electronic Injury Surveillance System dataset. Injury incidences of 3- to 6-year-old …

  • Development of snake‐directed antipredator behavior by wild white‐faced capuchin monkeys

    Open AccessRichard G Co, Cailey Cavanaugh et al.ARTICLEAmerican Journal of Primatology2019

    In many primates, the acoustic properties of alarm calls can provide information on the level of perceived predatory threat as well as influence the antipredator behavior of nearby conspecifics. The present study examined the harmonics-to-noise ratio (tonality of spectral structure) of alarm calls emitted by white-faced capuchin monkeys (Cebus capucinus) in trees directed at photographic models of a boa constrictor, neotropical rattlesnake, scorp…

  • Drawings of Representational Images by Upper Paleolithic Humans and their Absence in Neanderthals Reflect Historical Differences in Hunting Wary Game

    Open AccessRichard G Co, Richard G CossARTICLEEvolutionary Studies in…2017References: 37

    One characteristic of the transition from the Middle Paleolithic to the Upper Paleolithic in Europe was the emergence of representational charcoal drawings and engravings by Aurignacian and Gravettian artists. European Neanderthals never engaged in representational drawing during the Middle and Early Upper Paleolithic, a property that might reflect less developed visuomotor coordination. This article postulates a causal relationship between an ev…

  • Drawings of Representational Images by Upper Paleolithic Humans and their Absence in Neanderthals Might Reflect Historical Differences in Hunting Wary Game

    Open AccessRichard G Co, Richard G CossARTICLEEvolutionary Studies in…2017

  • Development of Snake‐Directed Antipredator Behavior by Wild White‐Faced Capuchin Monkeys

    Open AccessWHITNEY MENO, Richard G Co et al.ARTICLEAmerican Journal of Primatology2013

    Young animals are known to direct alarm calls at a wider range of animals than adults. If social cues are safer and/or more reliable to use than asocial cues for learning about predators, then it is expected that the development of this behavior will be affected by the social environment. Our study examined the influence of the social environment on antipredator behavior in infant, juvenile, and adult wild white‐faced capuchin monkeys ( Cebus cap…

  • Development of Snake‐Directed Antipredator Behavior by Wild White‐faced Capuchin Monkeys

    Open AccessWHITNEY MENO, Richard G Co et al.ARTICLEAmerican Journal of Primatology2013

    Young animals are known to direct alarm calls at a wider range of species than adults. Our field study examined age‐related differences in the snake‐directed antipredator behavior of infant, juvenile, and adult white‐faced capuchin monkeys ( Cebus capucinus ) in terms of alarm calling, looking behavior, and aggressive behavior. In the first experiment, we exposed infant and juvenile white‐faced capuchins to realistic‐looking inflatable models of …

  • Intelligence and mate choice

    Open AccessMark D Prokosch, Richard G Co et al.ARTICLEEvolution and Human Behavior2009

  • The Effects of Human Age, Group Composition, and Behavior on the Likelihood of Being Injured by Attacking Pumas

    Richard G Co, Richard G Coss et al.ARTICLEAnthrozoös2009

    Documentation from the years 1890 to 2000 of 185 instances of pumas (Puma concolor) attacking humans in the United States and Canada has provided statistical evidence that pumas are less likely to kill or injure humans in certain circumstances. We identified incidents of fatal attacks, severe injuries, light injuries, and no injuries as a function of human age class, group size, body posture, and conspicuous action, such as noise making, running,…

  • The Role of Evolutionary Hypotheses in Psychological Research

    Richard G Co, Richard G Coss et al.ARTICLEEcological Psychology2004

    Properly formed and properly used evolutionary hypotheses invalidate most common criticisms and must be judged, like other hypotheses in science, through their ability to be theoretically and empirically progressive. Well-formed hypotheses incorporate established evolutionary theory with evidence of actual historical conditions. A complex, multifaceted hypothesis can predict patterns of phenotypic variation that would make sense if the hypothesis…

  • All That Glistens

    Richard G Co, Richard G Coss et al.ARTICLEEcological Psychology2003

    A number of infants and toddlers have been observed to mouth and to lick the horizontal metal mirrors of toys on their hands and knees in a manner not unlike the way older children drink from rain pools in developing countries. Such mouthing of glistening surfaces by nursing-age children might characterize the precocious ability to recognize the glossy and sparkling features of water long before this information is useful later in development. Tw…

  • Early environment shapes the development of gaze aversion by wild bonnet macaques (Macaca radiata)

    Open AccessRichard G Co, Richard G Coss et al.ARTICLEPrimates2002

  • Precocious Knowledge of Trees as Antipredator Refuge in Preschool Children

    Richard G Co, Richard G Coss et al.ARTICLEEcological Psychology2002

    In simulations of predator avoidance, 3 experiments examined whether preschool children with virtually no tree-climbing experience exhibit precocious knowledge of what different tree shapes afford as climbable refuge. Sex difference in the choice of arboreal or terrestrial refuge was also evaluated with the aim of detecting evidence of ancestral sexual dinichism, the differential use of trees by hominid males and females thought to have occurred …

  • Strategies used by bonnet macaques (Macaca radiata) to reduce predation risk while sleeping

    Open AccessUma Ramakrishnan, Richard G Co et al.ARTICLEPrimates2001

  • Evolution of the Modern Human Face

    Richard G Co, Richard G Coss et al.ARTICLEEcological Psychology1998

    (1998). Evolution of the Modern Human Face: Aesthetic and Attributive Judgments of a Female Profile Warped Along a Continuum of Paedomorphic to Late Archaic Craniofacial Structure. Ecological Psychology: Vol. 10, No. 1, pp. 1-24

  • Evolutionary Persistence of Ground Squirrel Antisnake Behavior

    Richard G Co, Richard G CossARTICLEEcological Psychology1993

    The evolutionary persistence construct considers the possibility that animals retain perceptual biases and behavioral relics from former historic periods of natural selection. As critiqued by Burton (this issue), this construct is suspect because it assumes that perceptual biases can be carried by the animal before it reaches the environment, a view contrary to those who consider behavior to be organism-environment transactions. Burton further ar…

  • Context and Animal Behavior III

    Richard G Co, Richard G CossARTICLEEcological Psychology1991

    California ground squirrel pups are frequent prey of northern Pacific rattlesnakes and Pacific gopher snakes. Although pups innately recognize that snakes are dangerous, they exhibit adult-like antisnake behaviors that are perilous. For the most part, adults apply antisnake behaviors to directly or indirectly protect pups. Two experiments using video investigated the evolutionary and developmental stability of antisnake behavior with the aim of i…

  • All that Glistens

    Richard G Co, Richard G CossARTICLEEcological Psychology1990

    For perhaps the last 5 million years, natural selection has acted on any failure by our hominid ancestors to find terrestrial sources of drinking water. The result of such selection might be manifested today in the strong preferences of children and adults for landscape scenes with water and observations of selective mouthing and licking of mirrored surfaces by infants and toddlers. Because the optical information about water can be ambiguous, th…

  • Provocative Aspects of Pictures of Animals in Confined Settings

    Richard G Co, Richard G Coss et al.ARTICLEAnthrozoös1990Cited by: 2References: 21

    The perceptual aspects of various animal pictures were studied to assess their aesthetic appeal in a high-fidelity interior mock-up of the proposed International Space Station. We examined a variety of mammals in light of two ecologically important attributes—the direction of their gazes and their apparent distance from the viewer—that could conceivably promote differences in subjective attitudes and sympathetic nervous system arousal, the latter…

  • Evolution of Art from Play (Continued)

    Richard G Co, Richard G Coss et al.ARTICLELeonardo1975

  • Non-Verbal Communication

    Richard G Co, Richard G Coss et al.ARTICLELeonardo1974

  • Biology and Culture in Modern Perspective

    Richard G Co, Richard G CossARTICLELeonardo1974

  • Analyzing Children's Art

    Richard G Co, Richard G CossREVIEWLeonardo1971

  • Electro-Oculography

    Richard G Co, Richard G CossARTICLELeonardo1969

  • The Ethological Command in Art

    Richard G Co, Richard G CossARTICLELeonardo1968Cited by: 4

    The ethological command in art is a review of certain aspects of form perception that may be influenced by biological evolution. The information from recent ethological studies, which examines the similarities between animal and human behavior, should interest the artist and augment his intuitive capacity to create aesthetic form. Many factors are involved in the evolutionary changes of most animal species. One factor that has guided the developm…