Professional Interests and memberships
Welcome!
I am an evolutionary anthropologist interested in advancing our understanding of human behavior. I was drawn to anthropology by my deep regard for the range and diversity of ways that people live and make sense of the world around them. My research is rooted in evolutionary theory and the powerful framework it provides for understanding the world we live in.
My research focuses on cooperative behaviors, i.e. helping, giving, and sharing. To increase our understanding of the full sweep of human cooperation, I study a host of naturally occurring (i.e. “real world”) cooperative behaviors, including food sharing in a traditional small-scale subsistence society, heroic responses to historical emergencies, and charitable giving in the large-scale industrialized society that I call home.
Professional memberships
I am an active member of both the Evolutionary Anthropology Society, which I have served as a session organizer and member of the annual awards selection committee multiple times, and the Society for Anthropological Sciences, of which I am a former executive board member.
Research projects and publications
Ache reservation food sharing
Micheal Gurven and I, with the support of Kim Hill and Ana Magdaleena Hurtado, collected systematic observational data on food transfers and household visitations of Ache forager-horticulturists in Paraguay. The Ache are well known for their extensive band-wide sharing of food when on extended foraging treks in the forest. Our more recent work examined food sharing on the reservation where the Ache experience more predictable (though less diverse) food sources, larger group sizes, and increased opportunities for privacy. Publications from this work, include:
W Allen-Arave, M Gurven, K Hill
Evolution and Human Behavior 29 (5), 305-318
Reservation food sharing among the Ache of Paraguay
M Gurven, W Allen-Arave, K Hill, AM Hurtado
Human Nature 12 (4), 273-297"It's a wonderful life": Signaling generosity among the Ache of ParaguayM Gurven, W Allen-Arave, K Hill, M HurtadoEvolution and Human Behavior 21 (4), 263-282This research also garnered me the Evolutionary Anthropology Society's inaugural Best Student Investigator Award and formed the basis of my participation in an American Anthropological Association Executive Program Committee Invited Session on ethnographic methods.Charitable giving
With funding from the National Science Foundation Cultural Anthropology Program, I conducted structured face-to-face interviews with members of over 500 households to collect measures of household charitable giving patterns and social support networks. I have presented findings from this research at meetings of the American Anthropological Association (Invited Session), the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center (invited speaker), the Society for Anthropological Sciences, and the Human Behavior and Evolution Society. Additionally, findings from this research have appeared in an article on kindness and generosity in New Scientist. Watch for upcoming publications of this research to include:
Unreciprocated generosity? Circuitous reciprocity and the social context of charitable giving
W Allen-Arave
Showing you care: The role of social reputation and social relationships in charitable giving decision-making
W Allen-Arave
Do charitable donations buy friends? Generosity and partner choice in social support networks
W Allen-Arave
Heroism and helping
I have assisted James L. Boone in an investigation of the impact of social class and reputation on the extreme altruism of men who adhered to the "women and children first" honor code in the Titanic disaster of 1912. I have presented this research at the annual meeting of the Human Evolution and Behavior Society, while Dr. Boone has presented it at the University of Vienna and at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association.
Connect and contact
Write:
Department of Anthropology
MSC01-1040
1 University of New Mexico
Albuquerque, NM 87131