estrous cycle

the cyclical sequence of reproductive activity shown by female mammals except humans and other primates; see menstrual cycle. Animals that experience one estrous cycle per year are called monestrous; those that have multiple estrous cycles annually are polyestrous. See also diestrus; estrus; proestrus.

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Psychology term of the day

January 20th 2025

criminal anthropology

an early positivist approach to criminology (see positivist criminology) associated with the theories of Italian criminologist and psychiatrist Cesare Lombroso (1835–1909). It embraced the notion of the “born criminal” or criminal type, based on the belief that criminals had certain physical characteristics (e.g., sloping forehead, large ears) that distinguished them from noncriminals. Lombroso identified these characteristics as “atavistic anomalies… that bring man closer to the inferior animals,” then developed a hypothesis that linked delinquency to constitutional anomalies and attributed the primal cause of crime to hereditary flaws.