The UNESCO Statements on Race of the early 1950s are understood to have marked a consensus amongst natural scientists and social scientists that 'race' is a social construct. Human biological diversity was shown to be predominantly clinal, or gradual, not discreet, and clustered, as racial naturalism implied. From the seventies social constructionists added that the vast majority of human genet...

The article discusses the impact of contemporary culture on the individual's personality. We used the "psychocultural" approach whose key feature is the amalgamation of theories and methods belonging to psychodynamic and psychosocial studies, as well as those used in the field of media and cultural studies. The idea of a potentially therapeutic effect of culture (therapy culture) can already be...

Social life is generally associated with an increased exposure to pathogens and parasites, due to factors such as high population density, frequent physical contact and the use of perennial nest sites. However, sociality also permits the evolution of new collective behavioural defences. Wood ants, Formica paralugubris, commonly bring back pieces of solidified coniferous resin to their nest. Man...

To prevent epidemics, insect societies have evolved collective disease defences that are highly effective at curing exposed individuals and limiting disease transmission to healthy group members. Grooming is an important sanitary behaviour--either performed towards oneself (self-grooming) or towards others (allogrooming)--to remove infectious agents from the body surface of exposed individuals,...