title: Health costs of reproduction are minimal despite high fertility, mortality and subsistence lifestyle.
abstract: Women exhibit greater morbidity than men despite higher life expectancy. An evolutionary life history framework predicts that energy invested in reproduction trades-off against investments in maintenance and survival. Direct costs of reproduction may therefore contribute to higher morbidity, especially for women given their greater direct energetic contributions to reproduction. We explore multiple indicators of somatic condition among Tsimane forager-horticulturalist women (Total Fertility Rate = 9.1; n =  592 aged 15-44 years, n = 277 aged 45+). We test whether cumulative live births and the pace of reproduction are associated with nutritional status and immune function using longitudinal data spanning 10 years. Higher parity and faster reproductive pace are associated with lower nutritional status (indicated by weight, body mass index, body fat) in a cross-section, but longitudinal analyses show improvements in women's nutritional status with age. Biomarkers of immune function and anemia vary little with parity or pace of reproduction. Our findings demonstrate that even under energy-limited and infectious conditions, women are buffered from the potential depleting effects of rapid reproduction and compound offspring dependency characteristic of human life histories.
authors.affiliation: Department of Anthropology, University of California-Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Gurven
authors.affiliation: Population Studies Center, Graduate Group in Demography, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA.
authors.forename: Megan
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Costa
authors.affiliation: Department of Anthropology, University of California-Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA.
authors.lastname: Ben Trumble
authors.affiliation: Institute for Advanced Study in Toulouse, Toulouse, France.|Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA.
authors.forename: Jonathan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Stieglitz
authors.affiliation: Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA.
authors.forename: Bret
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Beheim
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, Universidad de San Simón, Cochabamba, Bolivia.
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Eid Rodriguez
authors.affiliation: Department of Anthropology, Emory University, Atlanta, GA, USA.
authors.forename: Paul L
authors.initials: PL
authors.lastname: Hooper
authors.affiliation: Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA.
authors.forename: Hillard
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Kaplan
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D003141:Communicable Diseases / Q000276:immunology*; D005260:Female; D005298:Fertility; D006801:Humans; D008019:Life Style; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008875:Middle Aged; D009752:Nutritional Status; D012098:Reproduction; D055815:Young Adult