Grandparental and Extended Kin Relationships

Abstract

Abstract This chapter argues that grandparenthood may trigger psychological adaptations with relationship-specific features. Grandparental investment cannot be understood adequately without consideration of its Darwinian fitness consequences. Relationships with aunts/uncles and nieces/nephews also cannot be understood without such a consideration. Because parents are mediators of grandparent and grandchild relationships, the evolutionary analysis of grandparenthood sheds light on the seemingly universal plight of in-law relationships, most conspicuous in the conflict between mothers-in-law and daughters-in-law. Investment in progeny and emotional closeness of intergenerational dyads is highly and robustly structured. This structure is parsimoniously and to a considerable extent accounted for by a few basic reproductively relevant variables including sex-specific reproductive strategy and relationship uncertainty.

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