EVOLUTIONARY PSYCHOLOGY FORUM ARCHIVE
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I. Evolutionary Psychology: As We Live and Breed
James Brody · 12/11/02 at 1:55 PM ET
Evolutionary Psychology: As We Live and Breed Framework: Selection's Arrow Evolution occurs in a universe defined somewhat by physics, chemistry, and information networks. It can be said that evolution travels in the mid range of on/off switches called "phase transitions" by statistical physicists and mathematicians (Kauffman, 1995). (See HO: Phase Transitions.) Chemists tells us about large molecules that organize themselves (Lehn, 2002). Information networks help us understand that 20% of the participants of an emergent organization will do 80% of the work (Barabasi, 2002). Evolution, a systematic change in characteristics over time, proceeds by way of natural selection. Thus, evolution is like a special version of "Fish." Step 1: "Give me all your cards smaller than 3." Or, "Give me all your cards larger than 10." Step 2: "Double the cards that you have left." Evolution depends on natural selection, itself driven by (1) variation in heritable traits, (2) selection by competition for survival and for mates, and (3) reproduction. Each generation is slightly more varied and complex than the prior (a recursive process, like compound interest) until environments change and existing traits can be neither supported nor erased. The average value (size, color, proportion of body segments) will change systematically. The average variation around each succeeding average frequently does not. Because variation is always present, there is no end to this game. It merely starts over when settings change and no longer support the former constructions that are made of organisms and environments (Lewontin 1998/2000). Utility for Practice: Evolution Makes Sense 1) What you are doing is natural and typical of most humans. We have an evolved "common sense" that consists of our shared psychological adaptations. 2) Emotions have functions: depression, for example, can be a tool for a distressed wife rather than a destructive emotion that demands medication. Anger (e.g., road rage) may be a first step to depression, it is also a tool for deprived narcissists. According to Bob Trivers: ".. friendship, dislike, moralistic aggression, gratitude, sympathy, trust, suspicion, trustworthiness, aspects of guilt, and some forms of dishonesty and hypocrisy can be explained as important adaptations to regulate the altruistic system" (Wright, 1994). 3) Automatic thoughts and their eliciting conditions are fairly uniform. Women feel angry and cheated and become more apt to consider new partners if their mate loses income. Men feel rage and jealousy if their wife loses weight, changes hair color, loses sexual interest, and runs up her cell bill. She may be dull, uninteresting, and irritable in his company but animated in his absence. Wives often object to husband's going through their purse; men seem far less possessive of their wallets. 4) Self esteem is often tied to success: success varies sharply with task. Attention and persistence probably correlated with task content and vary with each individual. Psychological assessments should not be for global traits. 5) Evolutionary analysis ("...at least there's a reason for this behavior...") should reduce blaming and encourage behavioral and cognitive interventions. It might also influence the interventions that we offer (which is one thing) and that our client accepts (which is another). 6) Referrals to our services have a contingent aspect (many people do not come to our attention but are little different from the guy in our office) and a selective one (We compete to get the referral but negotiate with each client to retain it. Referrals also exhibit network phenomena: them-that-has tend to get more. 7) It's entertaining: we gossip about sex and death. (So do birds and fish.) Examples: women's menstrual state affects their preferences for guy's smelly T-shirts and predicts the physical symmetry of the shirt's owner! Women wear shorter skirts and more jewelry and are most likely to commit adultery when they ovulate and men in bars are more likely to touch ovulating women. Notes & Refs: Kauffman, S. (1995) At Home in the Universe: The Search for the Laws of Self Organization and Complexity. NY: Oxford. Brody, J. F. (6/7/00) Life at the edge: Complicators and simplifiers in human transactions. Society for Across Species Comparisons and Psychopathology, Amherst, MA. Brody, J. F., (In press) From Physics and Evolutionary Neuroscience to Psychotherapy: Phase Transitions and Adaptations, Diagnosis and Treatment. In G. Cory and R. Gardner (Eds.) The Evolutionary Neuroscience of Paul MacLean: Frontiers and Convergence, Praeger-Greenwood, pp. 1-25. due November, 2002. Copyright James Brody, all rights reserved, 2002
Lehn, Jean Marie (2002) Toward self organization and complex matter. Science, 295: 2400-2407.
Barabasi, A-L (2002) Linked: The New Science of Networks. NY: Perseus.
Lewontin, R. (1998/2000) Triple helix: Gene, organism, environment. Cambridge, MA: Havard.
Robert Trivers (1971) cited in Wright, R. (1994) The Moral Animal. The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology. New York: Pantheon, p. 191.
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