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Evolutionary psychology is a theoretical approach in psychology that examines cognition and behavior from a modern evolutionary perspective. [1] [2] It seeks to identify human psychological adaptations with regards to the ancestral problems they evolved to solve.
David Michael Buss (born April 14, 1953) is an American evolutionary psychologist at the University of Texas at Austin, researching human sex differences in mate selection. He is considered one of the founders of evolutionary psychology .
Evolutionary psychologists consider Charles Darwin's theory of natural selection to be important to an understanding of psychology. [1] Natural selection occurs because individual organisms who are genetically better suited to the current environment leave more descendants, and their genes spread through the population, thus explaining why organisms fit their environments so closely. [1]
Evolutionary psychologists Martin Daly and Margo Wilson propose that the Cinderella effect is a direct consequence of the modern evolutionary theory of inclusive fitness, especially parental investment theory. They argue that human child rearing is so prolonged and costly that "a parental psychology shaped by natural selection is unlikely to be ...
According to Bateman's principle, human females display less variance in their Lifespan Reproductive Success, due to their high obligatory parental investment. [64] Human female sexual selection is indicated by sexually dimorphism, especially in traits that serve little other evolutionary purpose, such as the presence in men of beards, overall ...
Additionally, evolutionary developmental psychologists emphasize research on psychological development and behaviors across the lifespan. Pioneers of EDP contrast their work with that of mainstream evolutionary psychologists, who they argue focus primarily on adults, especially on behaviors related to socializing and mating. [1]
The history of evolutionary psychology began with Charles Darwin, who said that humans have social instincts that evolved by natural selection.Darwin's work inspired later psychologists such as William James and Sigmund Freud but for most of the 20th century psychologists focused more on behaviorism and proximate explanations for human behavior.
A number of evolutionary psychologists in particular posit that human psychology, including emotion and cognition, is influenced by evolutionary processes. [1] These theorists argue that although psychological variation appears between individuals, the majority of our psychological mechanisms are adapted specifically to solve recurrent problems ...