Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
A psychological adaptation seen universally in humans is to easily learn a fear of snakes. [1] A psychological adaptation is a functional, cognitive or behavioral trait that benefits an organism in its environment. Psychological adaptations fall under the scope of evolved psychological mechanisms (EPMs), [2] however, EPMs refer to a less ...
Organisms begin as naive individuals and learning allows them to obtain the knowledge they need to adapt and survive. A learned adaptive behavior must have a psychological, as well as a biological, component; without the integration of these two disciplines, behavioral adaptation cannot occur.
In evolutionary psychology, people often speak of the four Fs which are said to be the four basic and most primal drives (motivations or instincts) that animals (including humans) are evolutionarily adapted to have, follow, and achieve: fighting, fleeing, feeding and fucking (a more polite synonym is the word "mating"). [1]
Cooperation exists not only in humans but in other animals as well. The diversity of taxa that exhibits cooperation is quite large, ranging from zebra herds to pied babblers to African elephants. Many animal and plant species cooperate with both members of their own species and with members of other species.
Evolutionary psychology primarily uses the theories of natural selection, sexual selection, and inclusive fitness to explain the evolution of psychological adaptations. Evolutionary psychology is sometimes seen not simply as a subdiscipline of psychology but as a metatheoretical framework in which the entire field of psychology can be examined. [4]
The tabulated schema is used as the central organizing device in many animal behaviour, ethology, behavioural ecology and evolutionary psychology textbooks (e.g., Alcock, 2001). One advantage of this organizational system, what might be called the "periodic table of life sciences," is that it highlights gaps in knowledge, analogous to the role ...
Not all traits of organisms are evolutionary adaptations. As noted in the table below, traits may also be exaptations, byproducts of adaptations (sometimes called "spandrels"), or random variation between individuals. [40] Psychological adaptations are hypothesized to be innate or relatively easy to learn and to manifest in cultures worldwide.
Behavioral ecology, also spelled behavioural ecology, is the study of the evolutionary basis for animal behavior due to ecological pressures. Behavioral ecology emerged from ethology after Niko Tinbergen outlined four questions to address when studying animal behaviors: What are the proximate causes, ontogeny, survival value, and phylogeny of a behavior?