question

1.Which primate paleo-genus is found in the Fayum and is probably close to the ancestry of both major groups of living Old World anthropoids?

answer

Aegyptopithecus; Oligocene

question

2.About when did the initial hominid divergence from the African hominoids most likely occur?

answer

Later Miocene, 10-7 million years ago

question

3.What is a hominin's defining characteristics?

answer

Bipedal locomotion, large brain size and tool making behavior as being significant (at some stage) in defining what makes a Hominin a Hominin.

question

4. What are the adaptive advantages of bipedalism?

answer

Free hands for carrying objects, making and using tools. Wider view of the surrounding countryside and in open/ semi-open terrain, early spotting of predators. Efficient way of covering long distance.

question

5.Anatomical changes in hominins indicative of habitual bipedal locomotion include...

answer

Change in the pelvis (helps to stabilize the line of weight in a bipedal posture from the lower back to the hip joint). Having a divergent large toe helped with grasping and climbing but is less capable as a stable platform during bipedal locomotion.

question

6.The earliest stone tools are dated to approximately...

answer

2.6 million years ago

question

7.The estimated average cranial capacity for Homo habilis is

answer

631 cm cubed

question

8.The earliest australopith fossils come from ...

answer

Central African site called Toros- menalla

question

9.The hominin fossils from Laetoli and Hadar are classified by most researchers as...

answer

Australopithecus Afarensis

question

10.Recently discovered remains from the Tugen Hills, dated to about 6 million years ago have been placed in which genus?

answer

Orrorin

question

11.Sahelanthropus has an unusual combination of characteristics, including

answer

A small braincase and huge brow ridges, The upper canine is reduced and is worn down from the tip called the honing complex ( the sharing of a large upper canine with the first lower premolar, with the wear leading to honing of the surfaces of both teeth)

question

12.Which situations would be best suited to the carbon-14 dating technique?

answer

To date organic materials ranging from less than 1,000 years up to around 50,000 years old.

question

13.Potassium-40 (40K) decays to...

answer

To the gas argon-40 and has a half-life of 1.25 billion years

question

14.The current evidence indicates that hominins possessed all the major structural changes necessary for bipedalism by... (years ago)

answer

5 to 7 million years ago

question

15.What are the contributions of Olduvai research?

answer

Found that hominins were already inventing and adopting culture as a mean to deal with the world around them. Found the fossil material Homo Habilis "handy man" since they were tool makers. Found a nearly complete cranium.

question

16.The key artifacts in the Oldowan tool tradition are:

answer

- Stone artifact manufacture, large mammal butchery and novel transport and discard behaviors. - Assemblages mostly consisted of stone flakes which were used for cutting; hammer stones used as the name implies, core tools such as choppers which so considerable battering on the edges, and stone cores which were used only as a source of flakes. - Oldest tools that archaeologists can reliably identify

question

17.Radiometric dating techniques are based on what principle?

answer

technique used to date materials such as rocks, usually based on a comparison between the observed abundance of a naturally occurring radioactive isotope and its decay products, using known decay rates

question

18.Which dating techniques relies on the regular growth of tree rings?

answer

Dendrochronology

question

19.When a disease is continuously present in a population it is said to be...

answer

Endemic

question

20.Proto-hominins (pre-australopiths) lived approximately ... (years ago)

answer

6.0 to 4.4 million years ago

question

21.Could proto-hominins (pre-australopiths) use tools?

answer

Very possible because they could have used tools that did not turn into fossils for people to study

question

22.Which term refers to the process of attaching a handle to a tool?

answer

Hafting

question

23. If you were digging a hominin site that contains geological layers that resulted from volcanic activity, what dating technique would you most likely use?

answer

potassium argon method which is a dating technique based on accumulation of argon 40 gas as a byproduct of radiometric decay of potassium 40 in volcanic materials

question

24.The principle of superposition is a key component of what relative dating technique?

answer

Stratigraphy

question

25.Reconstructing human technology and material culture as a means of generating testable ideas about the past is known as:

answer

Experimental archaeology

question

26.The study of contemporary human societies as a means of understanding the past is known as:

answer

ETHNOARCHAEOLOGISTS

question

27. The spatial and temporal relationships between artifacts and features is known as:

answer

contexts

question

28. Which of the best defines an ecofact?

answer

natural materials that give environmental information about a site. Examples include plants and animal remains discarded as food waste and also pollen grains preserved in the soil.

question

29. What is the most common means of conducting a site survey?

answer

Wireless site survey

question

30. The study of the human past, primarily through material remains, is known as:

answer

archeology

question

31. Taphonomy is defined as:

answer

The study of how bones and other materials came to be buried in the earth and preserved as fossils. They study the processes of sedimentation, the action of streams, preservation properties of bone and carnivore disturbance factors

question

32. What kinds of evidence of hominin behavior are most likely available for study?

answer

tools and bones

question

33. Why are stone tools important for reconstructing the human past?

answer

Helps to place the time period because as time evolves, the tools get more advanced.

question

34. The term 'hominin' refers to:

answer

The evolutionary group that includes modern humans and now-extinct bipedal relatives

question

35. ___________ is the study of the evolution of behavior, emphasizing the role of ecological factors as agents of natural selection.

answer

Behavioral ecology

question

36. Ecological factors influencing primate social behavior include ...

answer

The distribution of food and water, predators and nutritional value of foods

question

37. Primate groups composed of several adult males and females are advantageous in what kind of areas?

answer

Where predation pressure is high, particularly in mixed woodlands and on open savannas.

question

38. Mounting as an expression of dominance in baboons is believed to also serve to ...

answer

Defuse potentially situations by indicating something like "It's okay, I accept your apology."

question

39. Amicable behaviors that promote group cohesion are called _______ behaviors.

answer

Affiliative Behaviors. Examples include grooming, reinforcing social bonds and promoting group cohesion.

question

40. In many primate species, ________ have/has a central role in reinforcing social relationships.

answer

social grooming

question

41. Are permanent male-female bonds typical among non-human primates?

answer

no they are uncommon

question

42. The term for a mating system in which males, and some cases females, have several mating partners is...

answer

Polygynous

question

43. What does K-selection refer to?

answer

An adaptive strategy whereby individuals produce relatively few offspring in whom they invest increased parental care

question

44. Species producing relatively large numbers of offspring and invest little parental care are ...

answer

R-selected

question

45. Infanticide by adult males can occur because...

answer

-Males kill infants fathered by other males -Maximizes the individuals reproductive status -Coincides with the transfer of a new male in a group -Once the male has killed the child, he fathers another infant with the victim's mother

question

46. What is the basic primate social unit

answer

A female and her offspring

question

47. Linguistic symbols are said to be ________ because they do not resemble the object or concept they represent.

answer

Arbitrary

question

48. Which non-human primates have been taught to use sign language?

answer

Great Apes: orangutans, gorillas and bonobos, chimpanzees

question

49. What do the language experiments with chimpanzees, bonobos, and gorillas indicate?

answer

They can learn the symbols but they cannot interpret what they mean

question

50. Currently, there are approximately _______ species of non-human primates.

answer

230

question

51. What is noteworthy about primate maturation, learning, and behavior?

answer

A more efficient means of fetal nourishment, reduced numbers of offspring, longer periods of gestation and delayed maturation.

question

52. Traditionally, primate characteristics have been explained as the result of adaptation to ________ environments.

answer

Arboreal

question

53. Using all four limbs to support the body during locomotion is called

answer

Quadrupedialism

question

54. Vertical clinging and leaping is a locomotor pattern frequently practiced by which kinds of primates?

answer

Colobus monkeys, Indris Lemurs, galagos, tarsiers aka found in Prosimians

question

55. _________ is seen in some New World monkeys, but not in any Old World monkeys

answer

Prehensile tail

question

56. DNA hybridization of humans and chimpanzees indicate they share about _________ of their DNA base sequences.

answer

98%

question

57. What are the defining characteristics of tarsiers?

answer

Nocturnal, insectivores, social unit is a mom, dad and offspring. Also their enormous eyes, ability to rotate their head 180 degrees

question

58. What are the most non-derived, or primitive, primates?

answer

Prosimians

question

59. Monkeys are divided into which two major groups?

answer

Old and New World Monkeys

question

60. What are the smallest New World anthropoids?

answer

Marmosets and tamarins

question

61. What is a hominoid? Examples?

answer

Members of the primate superfamily that includes apes and humans

question

62. Sexual dimorphism refers to...

answer

Differences in physical characteristics between males and females of the same species

question

63. Gibbons and siamangs are adapted for what kind of locomotion?

answer

Brachiation aka arm swinging

question

64. Mountain gorilla social groups are usually composed of

answer

One or two large silverback males, a variable number of adult females and their sub adult offspring

question

65. Chimpanzees live in groups composed of (age/sex)

answer

Males, females and a variation in age. They live in large communities in size from 10-100 individuals

question

66. What is a major underlying factor for the declining numbers of nonhuman primates?

answer

Reduction of Habitat

question

67. Ideally, taxonomic classification suggests what kind of relationships?

answer

Organisms are classified first according to their physical similarities

question

68. Structural similarities shared by species that are acquired by descent from a common ancestor are ...

answer

Homologies

question

69. What is the evolutionary process that produces analogous structures called?

answer

Homoplasy

question

70. Structural similarities shared by a wide array of distantly related species that are inherited from a remote ancestor, such as the number of bones in the forelimb, are termed ...

answer

Homologies

question

71. What is the term for traits that reflect specific evolutionary lineages and can be informative of evolutionary relationships?

answer

Derived (modified) traits

question

72. A hypothesis regarding ancestor-descendant relationships that includes a time scale is called a

answer

Phylogenetic tree

question

73. Speciation can occur as a result of ...

answer

Isolation

question

74. Morphological variation between individuals within a species

answer

May be the product of male/ female morphological differences

question

75. As discussed in the text, long-term continental drift had significant evolutionary ramifications because

answer

Groups of animals became isolated from each other by oceans, significantly influencing the distribution of mammals and other land vertebrates

question

76. What does the term endothermic refer to?

answer

Able to maintain internal body temperature by producing energy through metabolic processes within cells

question

77. What are Monotremes?

answer

Egg-laying mammals

question

78. What is the term for the rapid expansion and diversification of groups of organisms into newly available ecological niches?

answer

Adaptive radiation

question

79. What is the false belief that there is a relationship between physical traits and certain behavioral traits such as intelligence and morality?

answer

Biological determinism

question

80. What is the term for the philosophy of "race improvement" through the forced sterilization of some groups and the encouraged reproduction of others?

answer

Eugenics

question

81. What is a polytypic species?

answer

Species composed of populations that differ in the expression of one or more traits

question

82. In its most common biological usage, the term race is...

answer

Refers to geographically patterned phenotypic variation within a species

question

83. Why are anthropologists interested in the ABO blood type system?

answer

provide some of the best examples of Mendelian traits in humans

question

84. The frequency of the O allele (in ABO blood type) is almost 100 percent among which indigenous population?

answer

In south America

question

1. Lactose intolerance is characterized by ...

answer

A person's ability to digest milk

question

86. Population geneticists use the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium equation to determine ...

answer

The mathematical relationship expressing the predicted distribution of alleles in populations

question

87. Biological systems are balanced systems maintained by the interaction of physiological mechanisms that compensate for both external and internal changes. Such a balanced system is in ...

answer

Homeostasis

question

88. Acclimatization refers to ...

answer

Physiological response to changes in the environment that occur during an individual's lifetime. These changes may be temporary or permanent, depending on the duration of the environmental change and when in the individual's life it occurs.

question

89. What are some examples of acclimatization?

answer

A temporary and rapid adjustment to an environmental change. Another example is the very rapid increase in hemoglobin production that occurs when people who live at low elevations travel to higher ones.

question

90. What contributes most to skin color?

answer

Mostly influenced by the pigment melanin, a granular substance produced by specialized cells in the epidermis.

question

91. Dark skin is found in populations near the equator. Why?

answer

It is where the sun's rays are most direct and thus where exposure to UV light is most intense

question

92. What causes rickets?

answer

Lack of vitamin D

question

93. Mechanisms for radiating body heat include...

answer

Vasodilation: expansion of blood vessels, permitting increased blood flow to the skin. Permits warming of the skin and facilitates radiation of warmth as a means of cooling.

question

94. Bergmann's rule ... what is it?

answer

Concerns the relationship of body mass or volume to surface area

question

95. Hypoxia is...

answer

Lack of oxygen

question

96. What are disease-causing organisms such as bacteria and viruses called?

answer

Pathogens

question

97. The World Health Organization lists ______ as the world's leading killer of adults.

answer

Tuberculosis

question

98. What is the belief that species do not change but are the same as when first created known as?

answer

Fixity of species

question

99. By the 17th century, some scientists were beginning to break with long-held traditions and sought to investigate _______.

answer

evolution

question

100. __________________first recognized that species were groups of organisms that were distinguished from other such groups by their ability to mate with one another and produce fertile offspring.

answer

John Ray

question

101. _____________________refined the existing system of classifying biological organisms into a binomial system.

answer

Carolus Linnaeus

question

102. Charles Darwin was not the only one to conceive of natural selection. Who published an article suggesting current species were descended from other species?

answer

Alfred Russel Wallace

question

103. Who was the first to actually attempt to explain the mechanism by which species change?

answer

Charles Darwin

question

104. What is the view that the extinction and the subsequent appearance of more modern forms could be explained by a series of disasters and creations?

answer

Catastrophism

question

105. __________________ proposed that population size increases at a faster rate than food supplies.

answer

Thomas Malthus

question

106. The fact that individuals who possess favorable traits are more likely to survive and reproduce than those who possess less favorable traits is the basis for which theory?

answer

Natural selection

question

107. "Fitness," in an evolutionary sense, refers to an individual's ...

answer

Genetic contribution to the next generation compared with that of other individuals

question

108. According to the text, which is among the reasons that about half of Americans believe that evolution does not occur?

answer

Because of their faith of creation

question

109. A person who is homozygous recessive at a locus will express what kind of genotype?

answer

Two lowercase r's (rr)

question

110. What is the term used to refer to the observable, physical expression of genotypes?

answer

phenotypes

question

111. What is it called when a person possesses two different alleles at the same locus, and both alleles are expressed in the phenotype?

answer

- Codominance

question

112. How many ABO phenotypes are there?

answer

six

question

113. Mendelian traits are described as discrete, or discontinuous because ...

answer

- They are only controlled by alleles at one genetic locus

question

114. Two people (both heterozygotes) are able to taste a chemical substance called PTC. The ability to taste PTC is caused by a dominant allele (T). The inability to taste PTC is caused by a recessive allele (t). What proportion of their children would be expected not to be able to taste PTC?

answer

1/4 of their children

question

115. What types of traits are governed by more than one genetic locus?

answer

Polygenetic inheritance

question

116. What is the only source of new genetic material in any population?

answer

Mutation

question

117. What is gene flow defined as?

answer

Exchange of genes between populations

question

118. Genetic drift is ...

answer

Evolutionary changes produced by random factors. It is a result of small population size

question

119. Altruism is a behavior that ...

answer

Benefits another while involving some risk or sacrifice to the performer

question

120. Some of the deliberate nonhuman primate behaviors that serve as communication include ...

answer

To communicate information relating to their emotional state only

Anthropology Midterm – Flashcards

Unlock all answers in this set

Haven't found what you were looking for?

Search for samples, answers to your questions and flashcards