James Holland Jones

Associate Professor at the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability, Senior Fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment and Associate Professor, by courtesy, of Earth System Science

Bio

I am a biological anthropologist with research interests in human ecology, demography and life history theory, and the ecology and evolutionary biology of infectious disease. A sampling of current projects includes: (1) human dimensions of primate retroviral transmission, (2) the impact of mobility and social contacts on the spillover and transmission of avian influenza, (3) the demography of residential mobility among Hadza hunter-gatherers, (4) fertility change, economic shocks, and reproductive decisions.

Academic Appointments

Associate Professor, Social Sciences Division
Senior Fellow, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment
Associate Professor (By courtesy), Earth System Science

Projects

Coupled Contagion, Behavior-Change, and the Dynamics of Pro- and Anti-Social Behavior During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The current COVID-19 pandemic involves both tremendous risk and tremendous uncertainty about that risk, at unprecedented scales and across demographic and cultural contexts. The situation offers a unique and time-sensitive opportunity to study the transmission and spread of behavioral responses, even as the transmission and spread of the SARS-CoV2 virus occurs in tandem. We are studying the coupled contagion dynamics of COVID-19 and related behavioral responses such as hand-washing, mask-wearing, and social distancing. We are gathering longitudinal data from a probability sample of Americans in three waves. Our surveys assess risk-reduction behaviors, compliance with public-health mandates, and hypothesized predictors of response including trust in various institutions, social capital, and sources of news and information. We are developing mathematical and simulation-based models that jointly track the dynamics of virus transmission and change in behavior, which we will parameterize with data collected in our survey. These models may provide insights for improving public-health interventions, motivating compliance, and stemming the spread of misinformation regarding the epidemic.

Location

Stanford
Evolutionary Anthropology and Climate-Change Adaptation, Stanford

The idea of adaptation, in which an organism or population become better suited to their environment, is used in a variety of disciplines. Drawing originally from evolutionary biology, the study of adaptation has been a central theme in biological anthropology and human ecology. More recently, the study of adaptation specific to the context of human responses to the negative impacts of climate change has become an important topic and most current research in the social sciences on the adaptation falls into this category. While there are clearly commonalities to the different uses of the concept of adaptation, there are also substantial differences. We describe these differences and suggest that the study of climate-change adaptation could benefit from a re-integration with more broad-based biological and evolutionary conceptions of human adaptation. This integration would allow us to bring to bear the substantial theoretical tools of evolutionary biology to understanding system features that promote or impede adaptation. The evolutionary perspective on adaptation focuses overwhelmingly on diversity, since it is diversity that drives adaptive evolution. This suggests a focus for climate-change adaptation on the sources of innovation and the population structures that nurture innovations and allow them to spread. Just as adaptation thrives on diversity, the spread of innovations is facilitated by diversity in social structure. Truly innovative ideas are likely to arise on the periphery of cohesive social groups and spread inward. The evolutionary perspective also suggests that we pay careful attention to correlated traits which can distort adaptive trajectories. Finally, we suggest that climate-change evolution could benefit from a broader study on ongoing adaptations of local groups to their dynamic environments, a process we refer to as "autochthonous adaptation."

This is a multi-stranded and ongoing project with a wide swath of collaborators at numerous institutions.

Location

Bolivia, Namibia
The Most Rational People in the World

This is a book project exploring rationality, uncertainty, and the evolution of human behavior. It takes as its launching point a paradox which has only recently become apparent. By almost any measure, Homo sapiens is a spectacularly successful species. From humble origins approximately two million years ago, humans have grown to a population that exceeds seven billion and have colonized – and come to dominate – nearly every terrestrial biome. This phenomenal growth suggests that, on average, our ancestors made very good decisions. Yet a surging tide of work from psychology and economics makes the argument that the decision-making software that our brains run is profoundly flawed — that we are, in a word, irrational. How is it possible that a species apparently so defective in its ability to generate sound decisions can be so spectacularly successful?

Location

Stanford
Predictive Intelligence and Pandemic Preparedness

Location

Stanford
Subsistence Risk-Management Networks, Stanford

Location

Stanford
Ebola Modeling: Behavior, Asymptomatic Infection, and Contacts

The impact of unrecognized Ebola virus (EBOV) infection (asymptomatic and symptomatic) on transmission dynamics during the 2013–2016 West Africa Ebola outbreak is poorly understood. Individuals who had asymptomatic EBOV infection or unrecognized symptomatic Ebola virus disease (EVD) represent two groups who may have had different levels of exposure and rates of EBOV transmission. Increasingly protective behaviors to avoid contact with EVD cases may have resulted in lower levels of exposure, and these exposures may be associated with asymptomatic EBOV infection. On the other hand, individuals who had symptomatic EVD but were never diagnosed may be disproportionately important to transmission dynamics because some of these individuals were part of transmission chains leading to Ebola outbreaks in previously unaffected communities.

In collaboration with researchers at UCSF, UCLA, Harvard, and Georgia State University, our research question focuses on understanding the drivers of EBOV transmission leading to epidemic decline. Competing hypotheses are centered around issues of preventive behaviors, health-seeking behaviors, saturation of transmission among contacts, and asymptomatic EBOV infection. Newly available, detailed serologic, social network, behavioral, ethnographic, and vaccination data from research collaborations in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Democratic Republic of Congo will allow us to test competing hypotheses in the following aims: (1) Dynamical effects of unrecognized EBOV infection in social network structure, (2) Unrecognized symptomatic EVD cases, barriers to care, and preventive behaviors, and (3) Causes of asymptomatic EBOV infection. These findings have the potential to quantify what ended the Ebola pandemic and improve mathematical models. Mathematical modeling applications will improve forecasting during new outbreaks and inform ways to deliver vaccines to contacts, by ring vaccination or novel social network algorithms.

Location

Sierra Leone
Comparative Ethnographic Networks
Using relational data gathered from a variety of field contexts (Uganda, Bangladesh, Namibia), we are investigating the properties of sampled social networks, with an eye toward infectious disease transmission dynamics. Topics include: scale-up to landscape-level networks from egocentric samples, missing data models, and integrating spatial and relational dependencies.

Location

Namibia

Collaborators
- Mary-Ashley Hazel, School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences
- Elspeth Lianne Ready, School of Humanities and Sciences

Professional Education

Post-Doc, University of Washington, Center for AIDS and STD, Center for Statistics and the Social Sciences, Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology (2003)
Ph.D., Harvard University, Anthropology (2000)

Current Research and Scholarly Interests

I am a biological anthropologist with primary research interests in evolutionary demography and life history theory. In addition these fundamental interests in the evolution of human life histories, I work at the intersection of disease ecology, the analysis of dynamical systems, and social network analysis. My work combines the formalisms of population biology, statistics, and social network analysis to address fundamental problems in biodemography, epidemiology, and human decision-making in variable environments.

2022-23 Courses

Adaptation
EARTHSYS 183, ESS 185 (Win)
Global Change and Emerging Infectious Disease
EARTHSYS 114, EARTHSYS 214, ESS 213, HUMBIO 114 (Spr)
Imagining Adaptive Societies
SUSTAIN 131 (Win)

Independent Studies
- Directed Individual Study in Earth System Science
  ESS 292 (Win)
- Directed Individual Study in Earth Systems
  EARTHSYS 297 (Aut, Win, Spr)
- Directed Reading in Environment and Resources
  ENVRES 398 (Aut, Win, Spr, Sum)
- Directed Reading/Special Projects
  HUMBIO 199 (Aut)
- Directed Research
  EARTHSYS 250 (Aut, Win, Spr)
- Directed Research in Environment and Resources
  ENVRES 399 (Aut, Win, Spr, Sum)
- Graduate Internship
  ANTHRO 452 (Sum)
- Graduate Research
  ESS 400 (Aut, Win, Spr, Sum)
- Honors Program in Earth Systems
  EARTHSYS 199 (Spr)
- Independent Study for Honors or Senior Paper Writing
  ANTHRO 95B (Sum)
- Internship in Anthropology
  ANTHRO 97 (Sum)
- Research in Anthropology
  ANTHRO 95 (Sum)

Prior Year Courses

2021-22 Courses

Adaptation
EARTHSYS 183, ESS 185 (Win)
Global Change and Emerging Infectious Disease
EARTHSYS 114, EARTHSYS 214, ESS 213, HUMBIO 114 (Spr)
Topics in Earth System Science
ESS 301 (Aut, Win, Spr)

2020-21 Courses

Adaptation
ESS 185 (Win)
Community Leadership
ESS 135 (Aut, Win, Spr)
Global Change and Emerging Infectious Disease
EARTHSYS 114, EARTHSYS 214, ESS 213, HUMBIO 114 (Spr)
Social Structure and Social Networks
ESS 360 (Win)
Topics in Earth System Science
ESS 301 (Aut, Win, Spr)

2019-20 Courses

Biological and Social Networks
ESS 109, ESS 209 (Win)
Community Leadership
ESS 135 (Aut, Win, Spr)
Global Change and Emerging Infectious Disease
EARTHSYS 114, EARTHSYS 214, ESS 213, HUMBIO 114 (Spr)
Social Structure and Social Networks
ESS 360 (Win)

Stanford Advisees

Doctoral Dissertation Reader (AC)
Brandon Reynante
Postdoctoral Faculty Sponsor
Matthew Turner
Master's Program Advisor
Marielle Baumgartner, Jordan Strasser
Doctoral Dissertation Co-Advisor (AC)
Cesar Lopez
Doctoral (Program)
Ian Harryman

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