Lee Cronk
Dr. Cronk’s approach to the study of human behavior incorporates both evolutionary theory and the concept of culture. He and his students conduct research among living peoples in a wide variety of settings, using innovative theories and methods to examine the role of culture in current behavioral adaptations. He has conducted fieldwork among the Maa-speaking Mukogodo of Kenya on such topics as cultural change, ethnicity, parental care, and cooperation. In addition, he has conducted fieldwork in Honduras on the negotiation of familial roles and in Jamaica on dance. He has also conducted laboratory studies in the U.S. to explore the impact of social coordination norms on behavior.
The focus of Dr. Cronk’s current research is cooperation. Together with Dr.Beth L. Leech of Rutgers’ Department of Political Science, he is writing a book entitled Meeting at Grand Central: Cooperation, Coordination, and Collective Action. Their goal is to combine insights from the evolutionary and social sciences to better understand cooperation among humans.
To learn more about Dr. Cronk, please visit his web page on the Department of Anthropology web site (http://anthro.rutgers.edu).
To contact Dr. Cronk, please send a message to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .
Selected publications
Cronk, Lee. 2007. Boy or girl: Gender preferences from a Darwinian point of view. Reproductive Biomedicine Online 15(suppl. 2):21-30. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee, and Bria Dunham. 2007. Amounts spent on engagement rings reflect aspects of male and female mate quality. Human Nature 18(4):329-333.
Cronk, Lee. 2007. The influence of cultural framing on play in the trust game: A Maasai example. Evolution and Human Behavior 28:352-358. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. and Andrew Gerkey. 2007. Kinship and descent. In The Oxford Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology, edited by Robin Dunbar and Louise Barrett. Pp. 463-478. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [click here]
Cronk, Lee. 2006. Intelligent design in cultural evolution. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 29:352-353. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 2006. Behavioral ecology and the social sciences. In Missing the Revolution: Evolutionary Psychology for Social Scientists, edited by Jerome Barkow. Pp. 167-185. Oxford: Oxford University Press [click here]
Brown, William M., Lee Cronk, Amy Jacobson, Keith Grochow, C. Karen Liu, Zoran Popovic, and Robert Trivers. 2005. Dance reveals symmetry especially in young men. Nature 438: 1148-1150
(doi: 10.1038/nature04344) [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 2005. The application of animal signaling theory to human phenomena: Some thoughts and clarifications. Social Science Information/Information sur les Sciences Sociales 44(4):603-620. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 2005. Comment on “Signaling Theory, Strategic Interaction, and Symbolic Capital” by Rebecca Bliege Bird and Eric Alden Smith. Current Anthropology 46(2):239-240. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 2004. Continuity, displaced reference, and deception. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 27(4):510-511. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 2004. From Mukogodo to Maasai: Ethnicity and Cultural Change in Kenya. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. [click here]
Cronk, Lee. 2002. From true Dorobo to Mukogodo Maasai: Contested ethnicity in Kenya. Ethnology 41(1):27-49. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee, and Shannon Steadman. 2002. Tourists as a common-pool resource: A study of dive shops on Utila, Honduras. In Economic Development: An Anthropological Approach, edited by Jeffrey Cohen and Norbert Dannhaeuser. Volume 19 of the Society for Economic Anthropology Monographs. Walnut Creek, CA: Altamira Press. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee, and D. Bruce Dickson. 2001. Public and hidden transcripts in the East African highlands. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 20:113-121. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 2001. Anthropology and the evolutionary study of human behavior. Research in Biopolitics 8:1-30. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee, Napoleon Chagnon, and William Irons, eds. 2000. Adaptation and Human Behavior: An Anthropological Perspective. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter. [click here]
Irons, William, and Lee Cronk. 2000. Twenty years of a new paradigm. In Adaptation and Human Behavior: An Anthropological Perspective, edited by L. Cronk, N. Chagnon, and W. Irons, pp. 3-26. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter.
Cronk, Lee. 2000. Female-biased parental investment and growth performance among the Mukogodo. In Adaptation and Human Behavior: An Anthropological Perspective, edited by L. Cronk, N. Chagnon, and W. Irons, pp. 203-221. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter.
Cronk, Lee, and Vaughn M. Bryant, Jr., eds. 2000. Through the Looking Glass: Readings in Anthropology. Second edition. New York: McGraw-Hill.[click here]
Cronk, Lee. 1999. That Complex Whole: Culture and the Evolution of Human Behavior. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. [click here]
Cronk, Lee. 1999. Gethenian nature, human nature, and the nature of reproduction: A fantastic flight through ethnographic hyperspace. In Biopoetics: Evolutionary Explorations in the Arts, edited by Brett Cooke and Frederick Turner, pp. 205-218. New York: Paragon. [click here]
Cronk, Lee. 1998. Ethnographic text formation processes. Social Science Information/ Information sur les Sciences Sociales 37(2):321-349. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1995. Is there a role for culture in human behavioral ecology? Evolution and Human Behavior 16(3):181-205. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1995. Comment on "Gene-Culture Coevolutionary Theory: A Test Case" by Kevin N. Laland, Jochen Kumm, and Marcus W. Feldman. Current Anthropology 36(1):147-148. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1994. Group selection's new clothes. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 17(4):615-616. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1994. Sacrificing reality for the primitive accumulation of models. Journal of Quantitative Anthropology 4:185-189.
Cronk, Lee. 1994. Evolutionary theories of morality and the manipulative use of signals. Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 29(1):81-101.[pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1994. The use of moralistic statements in social manipulation. Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 29(3):351-355.
Cronk, Lee. 1993. Parental favoritism toward daughters. American Scientist 81:272-279.
Cronk, Lee, and Beth Leech. 1993. "Where's Koisa?" The World & I 8(1):612-621.
Cronk, Lee. 1992. Old dog, old tricks. The Sciences 32(1):13-15. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1991. Preferential parental investment in daughters over sons. Human Nature 2(4):387-417. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1991. Human behavioral ecology. Annual Review of Anthropology 20:25-53. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1991. Intention vs. behaviour in parental sex preferences among the Mukogodo of Kenya. Journal of Biosocial Science 23:229-240.
Cronk, Lee. 1991. Wealth, status, and reproductive success among the Mukogodo of Kenya. American Anthropologist 93:345-360. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1991. Hypothesis testing and social engineering. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 14(2):305-306.
Cronk, Lee. 1990. Comment on "Explaining biased sex ratios in human populations: A critique of recent studies," by Daniela Sieff. Current Anthropology 31(1):35-6. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1990. Stratification, bridewealth, and marriage patterns among the Mukogodo and their neighbors, Laikipia District, Kenya. Research in Economic Anthropology 11:89-109.
Cronk, Lee. 1990. Family trust The Sciences 30(6):10-12. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1989. Low socioeconomic status and female-biased parental investment: The Mukogodo example. American Anthropologist 91(2):414-29. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1989. From hunters to herders: Subsistence change as a reproductive strategy among the Mukogodo. Current Anthropology 30(2):224-34. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1989. Strings attached. The Sciences 29(3):2-4. [pdf]
Cronk, Lee. 1988. Spontaneous order analysis and anthropology. Cultural Dynamics 1(3):282-308. [pdf]