Physiological Correlates of Volunteering

We review research on physiological correlates of volunteering, a neglected but promising research field. Some of these correlates seem to be causal factors influencing volunteering. Volunteers tend to have better physical health, both self-reported and expert-assessed, better mental health, and perform better on cognitive tasks. Research thus far has rarely examined neurological, neurochemical, hormonal, and genetic correlates of volunteering to any significant extent, especially controlling for other factors as potential confounds. Evolutionary theory and behavioral genetic research suggest the importance of such physiological factors in humans. Basically, many aspects of social relationships and social activities have effects on health (e.g., Newman and Roberts 2013; Uchino 2004), as the widely used biopsychosocial (BPS) model suggests (Institute of Medicine 2001). Studies of formal volunteering (FV), charitable giving, and altruistic behavior suggest that physiological characteristics are related to volunteering, including specific genes (such as oxytocin receptor [OXTR] genes, Arginine vasopressin receptor [AVPR] genes, dopamine D4 receptor [DRD4] genes, and 5-HTTLPR). We recommend that future research on physiological factors be extended to non-Western populations, focusing specifically on volunteering, and differentiating between different forms and types of volunteering and civic participation

Shifting Boundaries Between the Biological and the Social: The Social and Political Contexts.

Segerstrale U, Maasen S, Weingart P. Shifting Boundaries Between the Biological and the Social: The Social and Political Contexts. In: Weingart P, Mitchell SD, Richerson PJ, eds. Human By Nature, Between Biology and the Social Sciences. Mahwah, N.J.: L. Erlbaum; 1997: 65-102

Social Darwinism in Anglophone Academic Journals: A Contribution to the History of the Term

This essay is a partial history of the term ‘Social Darwinism’. Using large electronic databases, it is shown that the use of the term in leading Anglophone academic journals was rare up to the 1940s. Citations of the term were generally disapproving of the racist or imperialist ideologies with which it was associated. Neither Herbert Spencer nor William Graham Sumner were described as Social Darwinists in this early literature. Talcott Parsons (1932, 1934, 1937) extended the meaning of the term to describe any extensive use of ideas from biology in the social sciences. Subsequently, Richard Hofstadter (1944) gave the use of the term a huge boost, in the context of a global anti-fascist war.Peer reviewe

Teaching Bioeconomics

Bioeconomics is a relatively young field that uses an expanded microeconomics to examine animal behavior, human behavior, and animal and human social institutions. A voluminous literature is rapidly accumulating. There are as yet no standard textbooks, but there are several excellent books and/or articles that can be used in combination with videos and other aids to make a course that students will enjoy and that teachers can use to advance the frontiers of scholarship in economics and biology. Copyright Springer 2005altruism, conflict, cooperation, evolution, game theory, institutions, rationality,