This article examines correlates of premarital sexual norms cross-culturally. Several explainations of restrictiveness of premarital sex are reviewed, and results indicate that accessibility of caretakers in childhood, class stratification and cultural complexity are all related to premarital sexual norms.

This study investigates political organization and the punishment of nonmarital sex. The author suggests that "the rules governing each type of nonmarital relationship are outgrowths of different relationships between controlling political bodies and local boundary systems."

The paper presents the preliminary findings of pilot studies testing the factors affecting the variation in rules regarding premarital sex cross-culturally. Only the trends emerging from the pilot studies are discussed. No findings are conclusive.

In this study of 80 societies, the author initially sets out to test the theory that if social customs and rules forbid satisfaction of sexual impulses, "civilization" will be built based on sacrifices of these desires.

This article reassesses the cross-cultural work on status of the elderly and tests two additional variables, socialization values and ancestor worship, as predictors of the status of the elderly.

While it is widely accepted that there are a multitude of variables that contribute to a society’s level of democracy, the authors of this study argue that the prevalence of consanguinity is one that is often overlooked. Using a sample of 70 nations, they tested the relationship between consanguinity (defined as marriage and subsequent mating between second cousins or closer relatives) and level of democracy (defined by both the Polity IV scale and the EIU Index) and found a significant negative relationship. Similarly, when controlled for a host of different variables in multiple regression analysis, the significant relationship between consanguinity and level of democracy held true.

This article reviews the theories on age-set systems and presents a cross-cultural test of Bernardi's theory regarding the development of age-sets as a response to a need for a system of integration in the context of frequent warfare. The findings do not support the hypothesis but rather point to the importance of changing group size and composition of local groups, as well as warfare, in predicting age-set systems.

This book discusses the characteristics of adolescence cross-culturally and examines the differences in the adolescent experience for males and females. Several relationships are tested in order to gain an understanding of cross-cultural patterns in adolescence.

This study investigates the relationship between cultural complexity and female premarital sexual freedom among foragers. To explain the decline of premarital sexual freedom, the authors discuss a few key trends such as the growth of social control and the decline of female status, as well as other variables such as intensification of foraging, social stratification, accumulation of wealth, political integration, and fixity of settlement. A model relating these variables is presented.

This chapter examines the variables that favor restrictive premarital sex norms. Findings indicate that subsistence economy, technology, population size, political integration, belief in a high god, and residence are all correlated with premarital sex norms.