Scientists are challenging the way many people think about ancient hunter gatherers, after finding that women may have been better hunters than men.
New findings have shown that while there are clear differences between the sexes when it comes to biology, the idea of men being naturally better suited to hunting is a myth.
New research from professor Cara Ocobock points to women being metabolically better placed to hunt.Ocobock is an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology and director of the Human Energetics Laboratory at the University of Notre Dame. She published a study on the subject alongside anthropologist Sarah Lacy at the University of Delaware.
The research also points to female hunters dating back to the Holocene period which were uncovered buried with hunting tools – and they’re challenging widely held assumptions over gender roles with the study.
Ocobock said in a statement:”This was what everyone was used to seeing. This was the assumption that we’ve all just had in our minds and that was carried through in our museums of natural history.” “Here we review and present emerging physiological evidence that females may be metabolically better suited for endurance activities such as running, which could have profound implications for understanding subsistence capabilities and patterns in the past,” the pair wrote.
That’s due to the fact that the presence of the hormones estrogen and adiponectin give women the upper hand when it comes to endurance – a factor which would have been “critical in early hunting because they would have had to run the animals down into exhaustion before actually going in for the kill”. (Indy100)
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