This study produced some interesting results. I would like to know more background such as how many villages were the 95 warriors from. I know with the Yanomamɨ the dynamics of war are complex. A warrior's success in an attack and also his long term survival depends more so on the village than his individual skills. I know of one village which had a core group of good fighters and they were very successful in war and breeding, while a number of villages they went against were not. A study done in that area would vary greatly depending on where the data was collected. The Yanomamɨ is a large enough group with much diversity. You can find situations that break the rules (female shamans, one woman with two husbands, etc). Any statistical analysis done on a small regional level could vary greatly from data which could have been collected in another region.

From direct experience with the Yanomamɨ I know that there are a number of factors at play regarding the warriors. The better warriors are typically the more successful people in many areas of life (hunting and gardening). Being a good warrior requires many skills and also a certain motivation - things which are beneficial in other aspects of Yanomamɨ life. So it is understandable that they could provide for more wives and kids, and they would probably be the kind of people that would take on that kind of responsibility. Being successful well rounded people with the honor of being a warrior certainly makes them more likely to snag (though the village lay about who does nothing more than chase pussy can be quite successful in reproduction). But good warriors are also the most sought after in war by their enemies, as are their kin so it's a double edged sword. Their traits work for them as well as against them. Whether a particular warrior results in being an effectual breeder is based greatly on the efficiency of his enemies.

The uniqueness of each individual and each village is something these studies don't take into consideration. I am sure if these studies were repeated in multiple locations among the Yanomamɨ the results would vary greatly because the situations would vary greatly.

Personally I take exception with anthropologists trying to find connections between a trait of a people and how that trait regulates some resource, with this trait being some kind of natural adaptation or consciously chosen method of regulation. One study was an attempt to show that the Yanomamɨ's war was a natural regulation of the consumption of wild game with the anthropologist weighing and measuring each hunter's take and trying to draw some analogy to their war making. When Yanomamɨ are at war they spend more time in the village and less time outside the village so their consumption of all things goes down in times of active war. However the wars are not effected by game, the Yanomamɨ do not fight over hunting grounds. Their war making is not some intricate regulation of a natural resource and that regulation is not some necessary balance. It's merely an effect, a byproduct. Can we really take it any further than to say when they fight more they hunt less for obvious reasons? Another theory put forth is the Yanomamɨ fight over steel tools. The Yanomamɨ fight to revenge deaths, they fight over women, and they will even go to war over rumors and other villages talking bad about them or daring them to fight. War and even just rumors of war will effect what a village does (spend more time in the village, flee into the jungle, visit other villages far away) and that can effect their reproduction, meat consumption and other things either positively or negatively. Each case is unique. Trying to prove it's this way or that is pointless. Trying to show that some cultural trait is a perfect adaptation and a complex method of regulation of some resource is an attempt to apply Darwinism in reverse - "survival of the fittest" ergo only the fittest survive or every trait some forest dwelling tribe has is some optimal adaptation.

Statistical data is hard to get even in literate, orderly societies, much less in an Amazonian jungle in a permanent state of war. Two straws in the wind, going in different directions in one of the dimensions.

Anthropologists tended toward extreme pluralism, at least until recently. Either the universalism is from a new school of anthropology, or from ev psych. I've read things by psych people which try to bracket out history and culture entirely.