David Samson

Professor / Author / Primate

David Samson is an Associate Professor of Evolutionary Anthropology at the University of Toronto, Mississauga, and Director of the Sleep and Human Evolution Lab (SHEL). He is the author of “Our Tribal Future: How to channel our foundational human instincts into a force for good”. Prior to joining the University of Toronto, David completed his PhD at Indiana University and a Postdoctoral Fellowship at Duke University.

David’s research directly addresses the central anthropological question of human uniqueness. In other words, the question that drives his work is what is it about our species that has made us the most successful animal on the planet? In the quest to understand what makes humans special, he’s comparatively worked with human and non-human primates (and wolves and dogs) around the globe to better understand the behavioral, physiological, and cognitive suite of traits that likely played a crucial role in our success. Specifically, his research investigates the link between sleep and human evolution through revolutionary new approaches, recording sleep data sets and sleep architecture for a range of primates including lemurs, zoo orangutans, wild chimpanzees, and humans living in different types and scales of societies. His research has probed sleep’s role in cognition, sociality, and group dynamics throughout human evolution.

David’s high-profile research program has been featured in such venues as BBC, Time, The New York Times, New Scientist, The National Geographic Society and The Atlantic. He is seen as an exceptional and energetic interdisciplinary scholar using broad, sophisticated research strategies to investigate major behavioral and physiological transitions in human evolution, with results that have significant implications for modern human medical, occupational and life-style issues. David brings a strong teaching and research program for both evolutionary anthropology and primatology for the University of Toronto.