Sexual Experimentation in Heterosexual, Bisexual, Lesbian/Gay, and Questioning Adolescents From Ages 11 to 15.

To examine adolescent sexuality development, we analyzed data from a British cohort study (N = 5,070), which assessed the same 12-14 sexual activities at ages 11, 12, 13, and 15, and sexual orientation identity at age 15. The sexual activities ranged from low (e.g., cuddling), moderate (e.g., kissing), to high (e.g., sexual intercourse) intensity. We found that most adolescents having sexual activities of low-to-moderate intensity with same-sex individuals also had them with other-sex individuals, and adolescents having other-sex contacts of low intensity often reported them nonexclusively. Furthermore, other-sex and same-sex sexual activities did not reliably distinguish between sexual orientation identities. Sex differences in these phenomena were absent or small. These findings suggest that many adolescents have low-intensity nonexclusive sexual behaviors.

An experimental examination of object-directed ritualized action in children across two cultures.

Ritualized actions are common in daily life, and prevalent across cultures. Adults have been shown, under experimental conditions, to treat objects subjected to ritualized action as special and different relative to objects subjected to non-ritualized action. Similarly, children as young as 4, are sensitive to ritualized actions-frequently reproducing such actions at high fidelity. The current cross-cultural experiment attempts to extend existing findings among two culturally distinct groups of children with regard to object-directed rituals. We predicted that children's preference for a reward would be influenced by ritualized action (but not non-ritualized action). Over two trials we presented children in Australia (N = 93; mean age = 6.03 years, SD = 2.07 years) and Vanuatu (N = 109; mean age = 6.13 years, SD = 1.96 years) with two identical rewards, which was either subjected to ritualized action or non-ritualized action. Contrary to previous findings among adults, ritualized action did not influence children's preference for a reward. We frame the current results in the context of socially relevant group rituals, and discuss the implications for both wider theory and methods. We conclude with a call for pre-registered replications.

It's not just conflict that motivates killing of orangutans.

We investigated why orangutans are being killed in Kalimantan, Indonesia, and the role of conflict in these killings. Based on an analysis of interview data from over 5,000 respondents in over 450 villages, we also assessed the socio-ecological factors associated with conflict and non-conflict killings. Most respondents never kill orangutans. Those who reported having personally killed an orangutan primarily did so for non-conflict reasons; for example, 56% of these respondents said that the reason they had killed an orangutan was to eat it. Of the conflict-related reasons for killing, the most common reasons orangutans were killed was fear of orangutans or in self-defence. A similar pattern was evident among reports of orangutan killing by other people in the villages. Regression analyses indicated that religion and the percentage of intact forest around villages were the strongest socio-ecological predictors of whether orangutans were killed for conflict or non-conflict related reasons. Our data indicate that between 44,170 and 66,570 orangutans were killed in Kalimantan within the respondents' active hunting lifetimes: between 12,690 and 29,024 for conflict reasons (95%CI) and between 26,361 and 41,688 for non-conflict reasons (95% CI). These findings confirm that habitat protection alone will not ensure the survival of orangutans in Indonesian Borneo, and that effective reduction of orangutan killings is urgently needed.