Mechanism for Avoidance of Incest
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 13649016 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Ray H Bixler (University of Louisville, corresponding author) |
| Year | 1981 |
| Volume | 48 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 978-978 |
| Publication date | 1981-06-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Psychological Reports (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0033-2941 • E-ISSN: 1558-691X |
| Publisher | SAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.2466/pr0.1981.48.3.978 |
| OpenAlex | W2071198386 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 2 |
Much of the confusion regarding whether or not a predisposition to avoid incest exists in Homo sapiens and many other animals centers around a failure to understand the nature of the mechanism.? There is no evidence that siblings, parents, and offspring have an innate ability to recognize each other but the evidence is overwhelming that conspecifics who are intimately associated during the infancy of one or both of them are not sexually attracted to each other irrespective of genetic relationship (Fox, 1980; Bixler, 1981). The mechanism usually serves to prevent incest among nuclear family members because they normally live together during the preadolescence of the offspring. Ethologists have identified many such indirect and apparently coincidental circumstances which serve to enhance fitness. Thus, avoidance of inbreeding as grounded in genetic predisposition has stringent and reasonably clear limits. Nuclear family members separated early in life would have no genetic predisposition to avoid incest nor are cousin-cousin, uncle-niece, and aunt-nephew pairs affected. Half-siblings and step-relatives would be predisposed to avoid sexual relations only if they were living together during the, as yet, ill-defined sensitive period. It is not surprising that nuclear family incest is rare and nearly universally prohibited while other relatives are encouraged to marry or cohabit in some cultures and vigorously restricted in others where they, nevertheless, commit incest more frequently than do nuclear family members (Gebhard, et al., 1965). The membezs of a mammalian species which can not avoid intimate association are the mother and her nursing offspring. It is no accident that mother-son mating is the rarest form of incest
Cognitive psychology · Injury prevention · Mechanism (biology · Medical emergency · Poison control · Suicide prevention · Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior · Human Factors and Ergonomics · Medicine · Psychology
| Highly cited | No |
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