Some rodents are social in that multiple adult individuals spend most
of their lives in close association with other conspecific individuals
, usually sharing a feeding area and a burrow system. The evolution of
such sociality has been related to the distribution of food resources
, the cost of burrowing, and the risk of predation. In this article I
review these factors in the context of fossorial and semifossorial rod
ents and show that most of this theory has been formulated considering
either North American ground-dwelling sciurids or African mole-rats.
I review the behavioral ecology of some selected species of New World
hystricognaths and suggest that future studies of species within this
group of rodents will broaden our perspective of sociality in mammals
and possibly ether animal groups. Such studies will provide the indepe
ndent tests that current hypotheses explaining the evolution of social
ity need. I identify critical predictions of hypotheses and suggest co
mplementary approaches to test them.