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Evolutionary Psychology
A Critical Introduction
Viren Swami (Edited by), V Swami (Author)
9781405191227, Wiley
Paperback / softback, published 14 January 2011
400 pages
24.1 x 18 x 1.8 cm, 0.816 kg
The last decade has witnessed an exciting change in our understanding of the way in which the mind operates and the reasons behind a myriad of human behaviours. The traditional idea that nurture trumps nature in explanations of human behaviour has been supplanted by the evolutionary argument that human beings share evolved mental architectures that govern their behaviour. This volume is an introduction to evolutionary approaches to psychology, bringing together seminal work in the field and exploring the ways in which evolutionary psychological research can illuminate our understanding of human behaviours and nature. Together, the chapters in this volume present a fresh perspective on evolutionary approaches to psychology, critically evaluating the extant literature while maintaining the need for evolutionary psychologies.
1 Evolutionary approaches to behaviour 1 A brief introduction to evolutionary theory 5 Fitness, sociobiology and life history theory 16 Evolutionary psychology 21 Conclusion 25 Acknowledgements 27 References 27 2 The evolution of cognition 31 Why are we so smart? 33 How did we get so smart? 38 What, exactly, are we so good at? And when did we ‘get it’? 46 Conclusions 60 References 61 3 Cooperation as a classic problem in behavioural biology 73 Why has cooperation been such a biological puzzle? 74 Individual-level solutions to the puzzle: Selfish replicators, cooperative vehicles 76 Cooperation via genic self-favouritism (kin selection and greenbeard altruism) 77 Cooperation via return benefits (reciprocal altruism, indirect reciprocity and costly signalling) 82 Summary of individual-level theories of cooperation 86 Group selection 87 Complex human cooperation: Collective action 91 Conclusion 98 Acknowledgements 100 References 100 4 Mate choice and sexual selection 107 Sexual selection 108 Which human traits are sexually selected signals? 115 Sexual selection and within-sex differences 116 Time allocation 122 Conclusion 125 References 126 5 The evolutionary psychology of human beauty 131 Facial attractiveness 134 Bodily attractiveness 145 Conclusion and future directions 162 References 164 6 Life history theory and human reproductive behaviour 183 Trade-offs in human life history 185 The optimisation of family size in traditional societies 193 The optimisation of family size in modern societies 196 Conclusions and future directions 204 Acknowledgements 205 References 206 7 Parenting and families 215 What is parental investment? 216 Who invests in offspring? 217 Familial conflict 227 What is invested? 228 Who is invested in? 230 Conclusion 242 Acknowledgements 243 References 243 8 Personality and individual differences 251 The current state of differential psychology 254 Personality and the evolutionary imperative 257 A cost-benefit analysis of the Big Five 262 Authoritarianism 267 Ability and intelligence 268 ‘Dark-side’ disorders 271 Conclusion 276 References 276 9 Evolution, cognition and mental illness: The imprinted brain theory 281 The illnesses that made us human 282 Antitheses of mentalism in autism and psychosis 288 The imprinted brain 294 Implications for evolutionary psychology 303 Acknowledgements 305 References 305 10 Interactions between cognition and culture 311 Social transmission 315 Gene-culture co-evolution of cognition and culture (mainly) in the hominid lineage 325 Conclusion: A niche construction framework of multimodal inheritance 333 References 334 11 The future of evolutionary psychology 343 A brief historical perspective 344 Can the EEA be made workable? 347 Universals and the challenge of explaining variation 351 Hypothesis testing: Alternative approaches 354 A vision of the future 359 Acknowledgements 361 References 362 Index 367
Subject Areas: Psychology [JM]
