Chapter 4 Flashcards
**anthropomorphism
The attribution of human characteristics to nonhuman animals.
**taxonomy
A biological classification of various kinds of organisms.
**taxon
Each species, as well as each group of related species, at any level in a taxonomic hierarchy.
**morphology
The physical shape and size of an organism or its body parts.
**homology
Genetic inheritance due to common ancestry.
**analogy
Convergent, or parallel, evolution, as when two species with very different evolutionary histories develop similar physical features as a result of adapting to a similar environment.
**ecological niche
Any species’ way of life: what it eats and how it finds mates, raises its young, relates to companions, and protects itself from predators.
dentition
The sizes, shapes, and number of an animal’s teeth.
prehensile
The ability to grasp, with fingers, toes, or tail.
diurnal
Describes animals that are active during the day.
hominins
Humans and their immediate ancestors.
**sexual dimorphism
The observable phenotypic differences between males and females of the same species.
cranium
The bones of the head, excluding the jaw.
mandible
The lower jaw.
postcranial skeleton
The bones of the body, excluding those of the head.
stereoscopic vision
A form of vision in which the visual field of each eye of a two-eyed (binocular) animal overlaps with the other, producing depth perception.
nocturnal
Describes animals that are active during the night.
Primate
A primate is a mammal of the order Primates, which contains prosimians and simians.
Ape
Apes are Old World anthropoid mammals, more specifically a clade of tailless catarrhine primates, belonging to the biological superfamily Hominoidea.
Monkey
A monkey is a primate of the Haplorrhini suborder and simian infraorder, either an Old World monkey or a New World monkey, but excluding apes and humans.
Hominid
The Hominidae form a taxonomic family of primates, including four extant genera: chimpanzees and bonobos, gorillas, humans, and orangutans.
Catarrhine
Catarrhini is one of the two subdivisions of the higher primates (the other being the New World monkeys or platyrrhines). It contains the Old World monkeys and the apes;
“sharp-nosed”, primates
Include monkeys and hominoids (apes and humans)
Some members are arboreal (“tree dwellers”), and others are terrestrial (“ground dwellers”).
None have prehensile (“grasping”) tails
Anthropoid
The simians (infraorder Simiiformes, =Anthropoidea) are the “higher primates” familiar to most people: the Old World monkeys and apes, including humans, (together being the catarrhines), and the New World monkeys or platyrrhines.
Platyrrhine
New World monkeys.
“flat-nosed,” primates
Evolved separately from Old World anthropoids
All members are monkeys and are arboreal (“tree dwellers”).
Some members have prehensile (“grasping”) tails