World's Best Scientists 2026 revealed!
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Social Sciences and Humanities
USA
2026

D-Index & Metrics

Social Sciences and Humanities

D-Index
91
Citations
68806
World Ranking
169
National Ranking
81

Research.com Recognitions

  • 2026 - Research.com Social Sciences and Humanities in United States Leader Award
  • 2025 - Research.com Social Sciences and Humanities in United States Leader Award

Overview

Robert Boyd is affiliated with Arizona State University in the United States. Their research primarily spans the social sciences and psychology, with a focus on evolutionary processes and human behavior.

Their work encompasses several subfields, including sociology and political science, cultural studies, experimental and cognitive psychology, safety research, and social psychology. Key research topics involve evolutionary game theory and cooperation, language and cultural evolution, evolutionary psychology and human behavior, experimental behavioral economics studies, primate behavior and ecology, child and animal learning development, and culture, economy, and development studies.

Robert Boyd's notable recent papers include:

  • Large-scale cooperation in small-scale foraging societies (2022), published in Evolutionary Anthropology Issues News and Reviews
  • Arbitration supports reciprocity when there are frequent perception errors (2021), published in Nature Human Behaviour

They have frequently collaborated with other researchers, such as:

  • Peter J. Richerson
  • Sarah Mathew
  • Minhua Yan
  • Maxime Derex
  • Jacob A. Harris

Robert Boyd has contributed to several distinguished publication venues, including:

  • Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences
  • Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
  • Science
  • Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences
  • Behavioral and Brain Sciences

Their book publication record includes a title with Oregon State University Press eBooks:

  • Indians, Fire, and the Land in the Pacific Northwest (2021)

Overall, the body of work by Robert Boyd encompasses extensive research on cooperation, cultural evolution, and behavioral studies through interdisciplinary approaches across social sciences and psychology.

Best Publications

  • Culture and the evolutionary process

    Robert Boyd;Peter J. Richerson

  • Not by genes alone: How culture transformed human evolution.

    Peter J. Richerson;Robert Boyd

  • In search of homo economicus: Behavioral experiments in 15 small-scale societies

    Joseph Henrich;Robert Boyd;Samuel Bowles;Colin F. Camerer

  • “Economic man” in cross-cultural perspective: Behavioral experiments in 15 small-scale societies

    Joseph Henrich;Robert Boyd;Samuel Bowles;Colin Camerer

  • The evolution of altruistic punishment

    Robert Boyd;Herbert Gintis;Samuel Bowles;Peter J. Richerson

  • Foundations of Human Sociality - Economic Experiments and Ethnographic: Evidence From Fifteen Small-Scale Societies

    Joseph Henrich;Robert Boyd;Samuel Bowles;Samuel Bowles;Colin F. Camerer

  • The Origin and Evolution of Cultures

    Peter Richerson;Robert Boyd

  • Punishment allows the evolution of cooperation (or anything else) in sizable groups

    Robert Boyd;Peter J. Richerson

  • The cultural niche: Why social learning is essential for human adaptation

    Robert Boyd;Peter J. Richerson;Joseph Henrich

  • Explaining altruistic behavior in humans

    Herbert Gintis;Herbert Gintis;Samuel Bowles;Samuel Bowles;Robert Boyd;Ernst Fehr

  • The evolution of conformist transmission and the emergence of between-group differences.

    Joe Henrich;Robert Boyd

  • Moral sentiments and material interests : the foundations of cooperation in economic life

    Herbert Gintis;Samuel Bowles;Robert Boyd

  • Culture and the evolution of human cooperation

    Robert Boyd;Peter J. Richerson

  • Why people punish defectors : weak conformist transmission can stabilize costly enforcement of norms in cooperative dilemmas

    Joseph Henrich;Robert Boyd

  • Indirect reciprocity can stabilize cooperation without the second-order free rider problem

    Karthik Panchanathan;Robert Boyd

  • Why Copy Others? Insights from the Social Learning Strategies Tournament

    Luke Rendell;R Boyd;D Cownden;Magnus Enquist

  • The evolution of reciprocity in sizable groups

    Robert Boyd;Peter J. Richerson

  • Shared norms and the evolution of ethnic markers

    Richard Mcelreath;Richard Mcelreath;Robert Boyd;Peter J. Richerson

  • Why Culture is Common, but Cultural Evolution is Rare

    Robert Boyd;Peter J. Richerson

  • WAS AGRICULTURE IMPOSSIBLE DURING THE PLEISTOCENE BUT MANDATORY DURING THE HOLOCENE? A CLIMATE CHANGE HYPOTHESIS

    Peter J. Richerson;Robert Boyd;Robert L. Bettinger

  • The evolution of indirect reciprocity

    Robert Boyd;Peter J. Richerson

  • Culture and the Evolutionary Process.

    Christopher Badcock;Robert Boyd;Peter J. Richerson

Frequent Co-Authors

Peter J. Richerson
Peter J. Richerson University of California, Davis
Richard McElreath
Richard McElreath Max Planck Society
Robert L. Bettinger
Robert L. Bettinger University of California, Davis
Eric Alden Smith
Eric Alden Smith University of Washington
Andreas Wagner
Andreas Wagner University of Zurich
Michael Gurven
Michael Gurven University of California, Santa Barbara
Frank W. Marlowe
Frank W. Marlowe University of Cambridge
Marcus W. Feldman
Marcus W. Feldman Stanford University
Karl Sigmund
Karl Sigmund University of Vienna
Magnus Enquist
Magnus Enquist Stockholm University

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