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Abstract

Evolutionary approaches to the emotions have traditionally focused on a subset of emotions that are shared with other species, characterized by distinct signals, and designed to solve a few key adaptive problems. By contrast, an evolutionary psychological approach (a) broadens the range of adaptive problems emotions have evolved to solve, (b) includes emotions that lack distinctive signals and are unique to humans, and (c) synthesizes an evolutionary approach with an information-processing perspective. On this view, emotions are superordinate mechanisms that evolved to coordinate the activity of other programs in the solution of adaptive problems. We illustrate the heuristic value of this approach by furnishing novel hypotheses for disgust and sexual arousal and highlighting unexplored areas of research.

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... Emotions evolved to serve an adaptive purpose (Al-Shawaf et al. 2015;Buss 2000). Even those emotions that are subjectively experienced as aversive and unwanted are necessary (Buss 2000;Nesse 1994). ...
... Even those emotions that are subjectively experienced as aversive and unwanted are necessary (Buss 2000;Nesse 1994). Anxiety and fear potentiate action tendencies directed at avoiding or escaping from threats; anger promotes aggressive actions that can ward off danger and facilitate competition for mates; disgust and disgust-related emotions (i.e., guilt, shame, embarrassment) mitigate eating spoiled/toxic foods and repeating noxious behaviors that could result in expulsion from a social group, and jealousy may signal threats to sexual or emotional bonds (Al-Shawaf et al. 2015;Buss 2000). Moreover, emotions that tend to be more pleasant, such as happiness, joy, excitement, and love, likely evolved to motivate various goal pursuits and enhance social bonds, which can enhance longevity, survival, and reproduction (Al-Shawaf et al. 2015). ...
... Anxiety and fear potentiate action tendencies directed at avoiding or escaping from threats; anger promotes aggressive actions that can ward off danger and facilitate competition for mates; disgust and disgust-related emotions (i.e., guilt, shame, embarrassment) mitigate eating spoiled/toxic foods and repeating noxious behaviors that could result in expulsion from a social group, and jealousy may signal threats to sexual or emotional bonds (Al-Shawaf et al. 2015;Buss 2000). Moreover, emotions that tend to be more pleasant, such as happiness, joy, excitement, and love, likely evolved to motivate various goal pursuits and enhance social bonds, which can enhance longevity, survival, and reproduction (Al-Shawaf et al. 2015). Finally, all emotions serve an invaluable communicative function (Tracy et al. 2015). ...
... First, we summarize and integrate organizational and evolutionary perspectives on emotions and leadership. This communication across fields is important, especially now that multi-disciplinary approaches to social sciences are blooming (Al-Shawaf, Conroy-Beam, Asao, & Buss, 2016;Buyalskaya, Gallo, & Camerer, 2021) and calls for more unified theories have been made in the field of leadership (Antonakis, 2017). Whereas organizational researchers have already examined leadership as an emotional process, and there are numerous evolutionary studies on the role of emotions in status navigation (see, e.g., Cheng, Tracy, & Henrich, 2010;Durkee, this volume;Durkee, Lukaszewski, & Buss, 2019;Steckler & Tracy, 2014), leadership and status are distinct constructs (see Cheng & Tracy, 2020;Van Vugt & Smith, 2019) and much remains to be done to integrate organizational and evolutionary perspectives on leadership and emotions. ...
... More recently, greater emphasis has been placed on the coordinating role of emotions as the "superordinate mechanism" activating, deactivating, and managing programs and systems within the phenotype (Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). This view expands the range of emotions considered and the range of adaptive problems they may have evolved to solve to include a variety of domains, possibly also embracing leader-follower dynamics (see Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). ...
... More recently, greater emphasis has been placed on the coordinating role of emotions as the "superordinate mechanism" activating, deactivating, and managing programs and systems within the phenotype (Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). This view expands the range of emotions considered and the range of adaptive problems they may have evolved to solve to include a variety of domains, possibly also embracing leader-follower dynamics (see Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). One might thus speculate that emotions simultaneously coordinate systems within the phenotype, while also serving to coordinate multiple phenotypes, facilitating leadership and followership and possibly even promoting a variety of groupbeneficial outcomes. ...
Chapter
This book provides a cutting-edge overview of emotion science from an evolutionary perspective. Part 1 outlines different ways of approaching the study of emotion; Part 2 covers specific emotions from an evolutionary perspective; Part 3 discusses the role of emotions in a variety of life domains; and Part 4 explores the relationship between emotions and psychological disorders. Experts from a number of different disciplines—psychology, biology, anthropology, psychiatry, and more—tackle a variety of “how” (proximate) and “why” (ultimate) questions about the function of emotions in humans and nonhuman animals, how emotions work, and their place in human life. This volume documents the explosion of knowledge in emotion science over the last few decades, outlines important areas of future research, and highlights key questions that have yet to be answered.
... Adherents of the evolutionary psychological perspective argue that their approach has several advantages over the traditional evolutionary perspective (Al-Shawaf et al., 2016;Al-Shawaf & Lewis, 2017). First, their approach covers a larger number of evolutionarily formed emotions than Ekman, Plutchik, and other researchers mentioned above, which is connected with the promotion of the idea that there are no evolutionary or other grounds for distinguishing emotions into basic and non-basic ones. ...
... Al-Shawaf et al. (2016) contrast two research perspectives: (1) traditional evolutionary perspectives and (2) evolutionary psychological perspective(Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). The main difference between them is the different interpretations of the evolutionary nature of emotions and the functions they serve, as well as the different understanding of the mechanisms linking emotions and adaptive tasks. ...
... Al-Shawaf et al. (2016) contrast two research perspectives: (1) traditional evolutionary perspectives and (2) evolutionary psychological perspective(Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). The main difference between them is the different interpretations of the evolutionary nature of emotions and the functions they serve, as well as the different understanding of the mechanisms linking emotions and adaptive tasks. ...
Chapter
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Evolutionary perspectives on emotion are the application of the basic ideas and principles of evolutionary theory to the study of mental processes and states of humans and other representatives of the animal kingdom associated with neurobiological activity and bodily change, which are designated by the term “emotion” (according to different researchers, and in different disciplinary traditions, there may be different understandings of what it is). Simultaneously with the identification of universal emotions in humans and nonhuman species, the uniqueness of the human emotions complex is emphasized. This uniqueness is attributed to the fact that this complex began to develop in our ancestors approximately five to six million years ago, as they tackled specific adaptive challenges primarily related to the need for becoming a more socially organized species. The evolutionary nature of emotions and the possibility of considering them in a similar way to other phenotypic traits — as a result of natural selection — were first drawn attention to by Charles Darwin in his work The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (1890/2009). This work is primarily about muscular movements of the face and body movements of both animals and humans, initiated by certain emotions being felt, that is, the bodily reaction to a mental event is considered. Their consolidation in the repertoire of facial expressions and body movements of humans or other animals occurs due to certain principles (the principle of serviceable associated habits, the principle of antithesis, the principle of actions due to the constitution of the nervous system), essentially explaining their origin and development through the formation of certain habits (Darwin, 1890/2009). Currently, the range of what is subject to evolutionary analysis of emotions and how they are studied has expanded significantly. The following describes how this is done in evolutionary perspectives developed in the disciplinary traditions of psychology and sociology. This is preceded by a description of the normative logic of the evolutionary study of emotions, which is implemented to varying degrees in the perspectives under consideration.
... While disgust is seen as an adaption (Al-Shawaf et al., 2016;Darwin, 1872;Tybur et al., 2009), few theories view the phenotypes seen in obsessive-compulsive disorder as adaptations. The obsessive-compulsive disorder patient is often engaged in reducing or controlling uncomfortable inner states through behavior that is often seen as bizarre and maladaptive. ...
... The speed and e ect of exposure therapy for phobias and obsessive-compulsive disorder, or the e ects of psychotherapy for depression with modern treatments mentioned above, suggest that the brain disorder approach is incorrect. We recommend an exploration of how underlying mechanisms may be adaptations and how evolutionary psychological analyses and methods focusing on emotions and cognitive structures can elucidate them (Al-Shawaf et al., 2016;Tooby & Cosmides, 1995). Instead of asking how the minds of those with mental disorders are fundamentally di erent from those not a ected by mental disorder, clinical evolutionary psychology should address what proclivities of our normal, evolved human nature make our species so vulnerable to developing mental disorders (Nesse, 2019). ...
Chapter
This book provides a cutting-edge overview of emotion science from an evolutionary perspective. Part 1 outlines different ways of approaching the study of emotion; Part 2 covers specific emotions from an evolutionary perspective; Part 3 discusses the role of emotions in a variety of life domains; and Part 4 explores the relationship between emotions and psychological disorders. Experts from a number of different disciplines—psychology, biology, anthropology, psychiatry, and more—tackle a variety of “how” (proximate) and “why” (ultimate) questions about the function of emotions in humans and nonhuman animals, how emotions work, and their place in human life. This volume documents the explosion of knowledge in emotion science over the last few decades, outlines important areas of future research, and highlights key questions that have yet to be answered.
... These limitations represent an opportunity for jealousy research-one that is particularly ripe precisely because scholars have already established these valuable taxonomies of inputs and outputs. Coupled with these resources, a systematic task analysis-including distinct analyses of the di erent problems posed by distinct instantiations of in delity threat (e.g., a rival is attempting to poach one's mate vs. one's mate has wandering eyes)-should enable researchers to organize jealousy's outputs according to the functional sequences in which they are deployed, and to make progress toward speci c input-output mappings (see Sznycer & Cohen, 2021a; see also Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). ...
... This example illustrates the utility of (1) considering how di erent cues may predict distinct forms of relationship threat, (2) conducting task analyses of these distinct forms of threat, and (3) carrying out costbene t analyses of jealousy's distinct behavioral outputs in the context of those di erent forms of threat in order to identify the speci c tactics that we should expect the jealousy program to deploy. We hope that research is soon characterized by this greater speci city about jealousy's information-processing and behavioral coordination architecture; the identi cation of speci c input-output mappings is a key part of a mature and comprehensive understanding of an emotion program (see Sznycer & Cohen, 2021a; see also Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). We anticipate that researchers will be able to make rapid progress toward identifying these input-output mappings by carrying out these analyses of speci c forms of threat and making good use of the extensive inventories of speci c inputs and outputs already available, such as Shackelford and ...
Chapter
This chapter seeks to invigorate work at the boundary of knowledge about jealousy. First, the chapter conducts a task analysis of the adaptive problem that jealousy is hypothesized to solve. This task analysis reveals key gaps in current knowledge about jealousy. Second, the chapter presents an array of new, testable hypotheses about this important human emotion. These include hypotheses about within-sex individual differences (in contrast to the historical emphasis on between-sex differences), hypotheses about within-individual shifts in jealousy over time, and hypotheses about the distinct tactics the jealousy system should deploy in response to different forms of relationship threat. Finally, the chapter emphasizes the need for more research on jealousy in relationships other than monogamous mating relationships, including consensually non-monogamous relationships as well as non-mating relationships. This chapter contributes novel theoretical insights and suggests future directions that can help generate new empirical discoveries about this important human emotion.
... For example, potential sources of contamination, such as spoiled food, bodily excretions, and other people perceived as being in poor health, are considered disgusting (Curtis & Biran, 2001;Rozin & Fallon, 1987). Accordingly, Al-Shawaf et al. (2015) proposed that disgust regulates information gathering, which is vital in avoiding contamination and mobilising memory resources for encoding potentially infected items. Also, studies with eye tracking have shown that participants engage in a broader exploration of disgusting stimuli when compared to neutral (Santos et al., 2023;Schienle et al., 2021), affording a more careful exploration of the potential risk of such items. ...
... The emotion of joy may carry information about love and affection crucial to mate-seeking, while fear and anger alarm potential threats and danger, compelling people to fight or flee. All the three high arousal emotions induce action, energy, and mobilization, making their recognition highly relevant to reproduction and survival success (e.g., Skuse 2003;Al-Shawaf et al. 2016). Given that the "fitness threat" hypothesis posits an exclusive negative bias for women in affective decoding, the "attachment promotion" hypothesis seems to be a more suitable fit for our data here (Hampson, van Anders, and Mullin 2006;Menezes et al. 2017;Thompson and Voyer 2014), where women are more sensitive to both positive and negative affective signals due to their biological competence and social roles in regard to caretaking, romantic relations, and socialization (Brody and Hall 2010;Collignon et al. 2010;Fischer, Kret, and Broekens 2018;Hall 1978). ...
Article
The discrepancies in existing literature regarding the gender/sex effect on voice-emotion mapping have left the nature of the cross-gender differences unclear. To enrich the knowledge of gender differences in acoustic-perceptual mapping in emotional communication, the present study employed an acoustic-integrated approach to investigate how Mandarin speech prosody is perceived by male and female listeners. One hundred native Mandarin participants recognized the affective states and rated the emotional intensity for 4,500 audio files conveying five basic emotional prosody (i.e., anger, joy, sadness, fear, neutrality) from a female speaker. The results showed that females generally identified emotions more accurately and rated them relatively lower in intensity than males. Meanwhile, acoustic-perceptual analysis revealed a higher predictive power of acoustic measures on male performance. The research extends previous findings by showing a general female advantage in emotion detection, especially in high-arousal emotions like anger, joy, and sadness. The current study suggested that the female sensitivity to minimal affective cues should be sourced to a high-level enhancement with a subjective empathetic filter instead of a low-level superiority on objective acoustic sensation. The complicated mechanism of gender differences in emotional This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. 2-X. Wang et al. communication and the importance of explaining recognition ability with an acoustic-integrated perspective are highlighted.
... Furthermore, psychoeducation about emotions and their evolutionary significance might be an interesting avenue to explore, addressing the psycho-socio-biological framework for conditions where INS is implicated. Emotions like fear, stress and loneliness trigger physiological and behavioral responses designed to protect and guide the organism [183]. By understanding emotions from an evolutionary standpoint, interventions can be aligned with our biological and psychological needs-an example being loneliness. ...
Article
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The interplay between socio-psychological factors and biological systems is pivotal in defining human health and disease, particularly in chronic non-communicable diseases. Recent advancements in psychoneuroimmunology and mitochondrial psychobiology have emphasized the significance of psychological factors as critical determinants of disease onset, progression, recurrence, and severity. These insights align with evolutionary biology, psychology, and psychiatry, highlighting the inherent social nature of humans. This study proposes a theory that expands insulin’s role beyond traditional metabolic functions, incorporating it into the Mitochondrial Information Processing System (MIPS) and exploring it from an evolutionary medicine perspective to explore its function in processing psychological and social factors into biological responses. This narrative review comprises data from preclinical animal studies, longitudinal cohort studies, cross-sectional studies, machine learning analyses, and randomized controlled trials, and investigates the role of insulin in health and disease. The result is a proposal for a theoretical framework of insulin as a social substance within the socio-psycho-biological framework, emphasizing its extensive roles in health and disease. Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus (T2DM) with musculoskeletal disorders and neurodegeneration exemplifies this narrative. We suggest further research towards a comprehensive treatment protocol meeting evolutionary expectations, where incorporating psychosocial interventions plays an essential role. By supporting the concept of ‘insulin resilience’ and suggesting the use of heart rate variability to assess insulin resilience, we aim to provide an integrative approach to managing insulin levels and monitoring the effectiveness of interventions. This integrative strategy addresses broader socio-psychological factors, ultimately improving health outcomes for individuals with T2DM and musculoskeletal complications and neurodegeneration while providing new insights into the interplay between socio-psychological factors and biological systems in chronic diseases.
... For instance, young children tend to experience certain infections rather mildly (Bhuiyan et al., 2021), so some adaptive biological mechanisms do exist and may help children survive in a pathogenic world. Alternatively, gathering disgust-related information, such as child's progressing wound infection, may be adaptive and allow for better implementation of countermeasures (Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). If so, being less disgust sensitive would permit unobstructed close-up examination of pathogen-ridden images. ...
... But before that, touching very briefly on the evolutionary psychological perspective on human emotions seems important. The evolutionary psychological approach conceptualizes emotions as superordinate coordinating mechanisms designed to regulate and orchestrate a variety of other programs in the solution of a specific adaptive problem (Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). In this respect, the emotion of disgust is a wellrecognized coordinating mechanism that regulates numerous physiological and psychological programs in the service of avoiding infectious diseases (Curtis et al., 2004. ...
... gibi birçok konuda rol oynar. Bu sebeple de duygu, insanlar için önemlidir(Al, Shawaf, 2016;Çeçen, 2002;Kavaklı, 2019). Dijital dünya ve yeni medya araçlarının yaygınlaşması ile birlikte kültür, dil ve iletişimde de değişim görülmektedir(Arslan, 2023). ...
Conference Paper
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ABSTRACT Technological developments have brought with them the formation process of a digital world. Media tools have also gone through this process and channels called digital media have emerged. Digital media, which has begun to exist in many areas of life, has affected and continues to affect societies, starting from the individual level. Digital strategies, from social media applications to digital marketplaces, create various psychological effects on individuals. In this study, the psychological factors that operate in the background in the digital world are discussed through the science of psychology that deals with mental processes and behaviors. Psychological factors that are influential in the digital world can be utilized by publishers, sometimes intentionally and sometimes inadvertently, as they draw from other applications and content. The aim of the study is to protect people and societies by paying attention to ethical codes. Both states and socially responsible brands have responsibilities to prevent the negative effects on individuals' mental health and the disruptions in societal sociology. Public organizations operating in the digital world and brands carrying out social responsibility projects should make the useful applications and content they produce more interesting. The psychological factors seen in the contents that have a toxic effect on individuals and society have been tried to be included in the literature with this study. Content creators, data analysts, psychologists, and other researchers and professionals involved in the subject are provided with compiled psychological topics influencing people's behaviors in the digital world for their studies on psychological factors effective in digital strategies. The concepts of motivation, learning, perception, attitude and personality that have an impact on the target audience were explained and their place in digital media tools was examined. The study also addresses general statements that are personally perceived by individuals, such as the Barnum Effect, and aspects like marketing communication that make individuals feel special. These psychological factors are expected to be supported by new studies and used in accordance with ethical values by public institutions and brands that produce content for the benefit of society, both to expand their audiences and to be more effective on their audiences. The study also has the potential to make individuals more conscious in terms of media literacy. It is thought that the information compiled and discussed in the study can be a starting point for digital strategies to be designed and new literature studies to be conducted. As a result of the study, attention was drawn to the importance of planning and carrying out interdisciplinary experimental studies for public institutions and brands operating for the benefit of society in the digital world. In addition, some innovations are presented as recommendations. Keywords: Digital Content, Digital Media, Digital Strategy, Psychology, Social Media. ÖZET Teknolojik gelişmeler, dijital bir dünyanın oluşum sürecini beraberinde getirmiştir. Medya araçları da bu süreçten geçerek dijital medya olarak adlandırılan mecralar ortaya çıkmıştır. Hayatın birçok alanında varlık göstermeye başlayan dijital medya, birey düzeyinden başlayarak toplumları etkilemiş ve etkilemeye devam etmektedir. Sosyal medya uygulamalarından dijital pazar yerlerine kadar dijital stratejiler, bireylerde çeşitli psikolojik etkiler oluşturmaktadır. Bu çalışmada, zihinsel süreç ve davranışları ele alan psikoloji bilimi ile dijital dünyada, arka planda işleyen psikolojik faktörler tartışılmıştır. Dijital dünyada etkili olan psikolojik faktörler, bazen kasıtlı olarak bazen ise kasıtsız bir şekilde başka uygulamalar ve içeriklerden model alan yayıncılar tarafından kullanılabilmektedir. Çalışmanın amacı, etik kodlara dikkat edilerek insanlar ve toplumların korunmasıdır. Hem bireylerin ruh sağlığının olumsuz yönde etkilenmesinin hem de toplum sosyolojisindeki bozulmaların engellenebilmesi için devletlere ve sosyal sorumluluk bilincindeki markalara görevler düşmektedir. Dijital dünyada faaliyet gösteren kamu kuruluşları ve sosyal sorumluluk projeleri gerçekleştiren markalar, üretecekleri yararlı uygulama ve içerikleri daha ilgi çekici hale getirmelidir. Bireyler ve toplum üzerinde toksik etki meydana getiren içeriklerde görülen psikolojik faktörler, bu çalışma ile literatüre kazandırılmaya çalışılmıştır. İçerik üreticileri, veri analistleri, psikologlar gibi konu ile ilgili araştırmacıların ve çalışanların dijital stratejilerde etkili olan psikolojik faktörler üzerine yapacakları çalışmalar için dijital dünyada insanların davranışlarını etkileyen psikolojik konular derlenerek sunulmuştur. Hedef kitle konusunda etkisi olan güdülenme, öğrenme, algı, tutum ve kişilik kavramları açıklanarak dijital medya araçlarındaki yerleri irdelenmiştir. Genelgeçer ifadeleri açıklayan Barnum Etkisi ve kişilerin özel hissetmesini sağlayan pazarlama iletişimi gibi hususlara da değinilmiştir. Bu psikolojik faktörlerin yeni çalışmalar ile desteklenerek toplum yararına içerik üreten kamu kuruluşları ve markalar tarafından hem kitlelerini genişletmeleri hem de kitleleri üzerinde daha etkili olmaları için etik değerlere uygun olarak kullanmaları beklenmektedir. Çalışmanın medya okuryazarlığı konusunda da bireyleri daha bilinçli hale getirebilecek bir yönü de vardır. Çalışma içerisinde derlenerek tartışılan bilgilerin tasarlanacak dijital stratejilere ve yeni yapılacak literatür çalışmalarına çıkış noktası olabileceği düşünülmektedir. Çalışmanın sonucunda, dijital dünyada toplum yararına faaliyet gösteren kamu kurumları ve markaların, disiplinler arası deneysel çalışmalar planlamaları ve gerçekleştirmelerinin önemine dikkat çekilmiştir. Ayrıca birtakım yenilikler tavsiye olarak sunulmuştur. Anahtar Kelimeler: Dijital İçerik, Dijital Medya, Dijital Strateji, Psikoloji, Sosyal Medya.
... And because differential reproductive successnot survivalis the currency of evolution by natural selection, design for reproduction takes precedence. This often leads to suboptimal design for survival (see, e.g., Al-Shawaf et al. 2015). ...
... For example, it has been suggested that individuals with less robust immune systems may have lower disgust thresholds (e.g., Fessler et al. 2004;Al-Shawaf and Lewis 2013;Al-Shawaf et al. 2015b) and that the emotions that arise after orgasm are likely different for men oriented toward short-term mating compared to those who are oriented toward long-term mating (Al-Shawaf et al. 2015b). Researchers using this perspective have also predicted and found that attractive women anger more easily than their less-attractive counterparts (Sell et al. 2009b), that attractive and physically formidable men anger more readily than their less-attractive and physically weaker counterparts (Sell et al. 2009), that individuals with less bargaining power are more prone to shame (Sznycer et al. 2012), that individuals with lower relational mobility are more shame-prone around their friends (but not around strangers, Sznycer et al. 2012), and that individuals with a stronger proclivity for shortterm mating have stably lower sexual disgust (Al-Shawaf et al. 2015a). The key point here is that, as with cultural differences, individual differences are not only consistent with an evolutionary psychological approach to the emotions; they can be predicted a priori according to theoretical principles. ...
... Emotion is mentioned among the many psychological components that contribute to the development or improvement of obsessive-compulsive disorder [3]. Emotion is a complex system that has developed throughout human evolutionary history and equips the organism to respond to environmental stimuli and challenges in life [4]. ...
... Because basic emotion theories assume that basic emotions are associated with specific patterns of information processing (Al-Shawaf et al., 2015;Ekman & Cordaro, 2011), it follows that basic emotions should affect memory in a specific and consistent manner above and beyond the dimensions of valence and arousal. Following this line of thinking, memory researchers have begun to investigate the mnemonic effects of basic emotions. ...
Thesis
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Psychological constructionist theories of emotion posit that individuals differ in their representation of emotions due to differences in the emotion knowledge they use during emotion construction. As a result, individuals are thought to differ in the extent to which they experience their emotions as being differentiated and distinct, a construct referred to as emotional granularity. Recently, it has been suggested that granularity may be a form of emotional expertise in so far as highly granular individuals possess structured knowledge about emotions which guides processes such as affective prediction and action (Hoemann et al., 2021). Even so, many of the predictions that follow from this characterization have yet to be tested. In the current study, I tested one such prediction that follows from the characterization of granularity as a form of emotional expertise: that highly granular individuals would demonstrate expertise-like effects for emotional memory. In particular, because prior research suggests that experts exhibit increased true and (under certain conditions) false memory for domain-relevant information, I predicted that highly granular individuals would show increased true and false emotional memory. Participants completed experience-sampling measures of their emotional experiences to assess granularity, behavioral tasks assessing true and false emotional memory, and several self-report measures of additional constructs thought to reflect emotional expertise. Contrary to predictions, overall granularity was unrelated to both true and false emotional memory. However, expertise-like effects were observed for negative granularity, alexithymia, and emotional clarity, as participants with higher levels of emotional expertise on these measures exhibited increased memory for images rated as being of a more extreme valence. Implications of these findings regarding the characterization of granularity as an expertise construct as well as directions for future research related to emotional expertise and memory are discussed.
... This framework holds that, if we are to identify and characterize the psychological mechanisms that generate behavioral variation captured descriptively in nebulous personality dimensions (e.g., "Conscientiousness"), it is essential to begin by building theory-based models of speci c behavior-regulating mechanisms. From this perspective, emotions are good candidates to explain personality variation, owing in part to their role in orchestrating functional responses to adaptive problems across many neurocognitive systems (Al-Shawaf et al., 2016;Al-Shawaf & Lewis, 2017;Tooby & Cosmides, 1990). For example, variation in the fear system-whether at the level of individual di erences or within people across situations-will orchestrate variation in physiology (e.g., heart rate), attention (e.g., a bias toward detecting threats), and manifest behavior (e.g., fearful facial expression). ...
Chapter
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This book provides a cutting-edge overview of emotion science from an evolutionary perspective. Part 1 outlines different ways of approaching the study of emotion; Part 2 covers specific emotions from an evolutionary perspective; Part 3 discusses the role of emotions in a variety of life domains; and Part 4 explores the relationship between emotions and psychological disorders. Experts from a number of different disciplines—psychology, biology, anthropology, psychiatry, and more—tackle a variety of “how” (proximate) and “why” (ultimate) questions about the function of emotions in humans and nonhuman animals, how emotions work, and their place in human life. This volume documents the explosion of knowledge in emotion science over the last few decades, outlines important areas of future research, and highlights key questions that have yet to be answered.
... Why might that be? Emotional expressions accommodate the meanings and practices of individuals' sociocultural context (Bruner, 2003; see also Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). ...
Chapter
This book provides a cutting-edge overview of emotion science from an evolutionary perspective. Part 1 outlines different ways of approaching the study of emotion; Part 2 covers specific emotions from an evolutionary perspective; Part 3 discusses the role of emotions in a variety of life domains; and Part 4 explores the relationship between emotions and psychological disorders. Experts from a number of different disciplines—psychology, biology, anthropology, psychiatry, and more—tackle a variety of “how” (proximate) and “why” (ultimate) questions about the function of emotions in humans and nonhuman animals, how emotions work, and their place in human life. This volume documents the explosion of knowledge in emotion science over the last few decades, outlines important areas of future research, and highlights key questions that have yet to be answered.
... We propose that the emotionality of narcissists, in particular of grandiose narcissists, facilitates their reproduction and survival, thus re ecting sexual and natural selection. In evolutionary psychology, emotions are strategies for achieving goals that increase the probability of desired outcomes (e.g., maintaining high status and self-esteem), or that reduce the probability of negative outcomes (e.g., preventing decreases in status and self-esteem; Al-Shawaf et al., 2015). For example, anger and pride (both hubristic and authentic), like in ated self-esteem, facilitate attainment of evolutionarily relevant objectives (e.g., Beall & Tracy, 2020;Cheng et al., 2010) via several routes. ...
Chapter
This book provides a cutting-edge overview of emotion science from an evolutionary perspective. Part 1 outlines different ways of approaching the study of emotion; Part 2 covers specific emotions from an evolutionary perspective; Part 3 discusses the role of emotions in a variety of life domains; and Part 4 explores the relationship between emotions and psychological disorders. Experts from a number of different disciplines—psychology, biology, anthropology, psychiatry, and more—tackle a variety of “how” (proximate) and “why” (ultimate) questions about the function of emotions in humans and nonhuman animals, how emotions work, and their place in human life. This volume documents the explosion of knowledge in emotion science over the last few decades, outlines important areas of future research, and highlights key questions that have yet to be answered.
... Based on an evolutionary perspective, some environmental stimuli have salient meanings, requiring very fast processing (see [1] for review). Accordingly, adaptive success depends on the efficiency in detecting and responding to emotional stimuli with high survival significance as in the case of food stimuli, mating partners, or signals of threat (e.g., [2,3]). Emotions are complex phenomena primarily concerned with the evaluation of the elicitors capturing our attention and with the immediate action selection among several alternatives [4]. ...
Article
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In the processing of emotions, the brain prepares and reacts in distinctive manners depending upon the negative or positive nuance of the emotion elicitors. Previous investigations showed that negative elicitors generally evoke more intense neural activities than positive and neutral ones, as reflected in the augmented amplitude of all sub-components of the event-related potentials (ERP) late posterior positivity (LPP) complex, while less is known about the emotion of disgust. The present study aimed to examine whether the LPP complex during the processing of disgust stimuli showed greater amplitude than other emotion elicitors with negative or positive valences, thus confirming it as a neural marker of disgust-related negativity bias at earlier or later stages. Thus, in the present study, we leveraged the ERP technique during the execution of an affective self-administered visual stimuli task to disentangle the neural contributions associated with images of positive, negative, disgust, or neutral images. Crucially, we showed that handling with disgust elicitors prompted the greatest neural activity and the highest delay during self-administration. Overall, we demonstrated progressive neural activities associated with the unpleasantness of the emotion elicitors and peculiar processing for disgust compared with all other emotions.
... The many di erent facets of the emotional reaction have to be coordinated because divergences in di erent aspects could undermine the adaptive response. Evolutionary psychologists list as many as 14 di erent aspects of functioning that might fall under a superordinate emotional regulation program: (1) perceptual mechanisms, (2) attention, (3) memory, (4) categorization, (5) motivational priorities, (6) current goals, (7) information-gathering adaptations, (8) specialized inference mechanisms, (9) communication and expression, (10) learning mechanisms, (11) re exes, (12) energy level, mood, and e ort allocation, (13) physiology, and (14) behavior (Al-Shawaf, 2016;Al-Shawaf et al., 2016,;Tooby & Cosmides, 1990, 2008Cosmides & Tooby, 2000). ...
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This book provides a cutting-edge overview of emotion science from an evolutionary perspective. Part 1 outlines different ways of approaching the study of emotion; Part 2 covers specific emotions from an evolutionary perspective; Part 3 discusses the role of emotions in a variety of life domains; and Part 4 explores the relationship between emotions and psychological disorders. Experts from a number of different disciplines—psychology, biology, anthropology, psychiatry, and more—tackle a variety of “how” (proximate) and “why” (ultimate) questions about the function of emotions in humans and nonhuman animals, how emotions work, and their place in human life. This volume documents the explosion of knowledge in emotion science over the last few decades, outlines important areas of future research, and highlights key questions that have yet to be answered.
... To phrase it in more cognitive terms, a hypothesis about the evolved function of an information-processing system leads to predictions about how the system must be structured to achieve that function: What inputs it must take, what inputs it is expected to ignore, how it organizes inputs in a hierarchical manner, what algorithms and representational formats it employs, and what outputs the cognitive system yields. This is precisely what the conceptual tool of evolutionary task analysis is used for: You start with an analysis of the problem that must be solved, and this yields predictions about how a psychological system capable of solving the problem must be structured (Al-Shawaf, 2016;Al-Shawaf et al., 2016;Cosmides & Tooby, 1987;D. C. Marr, 1982;Tooby & Cosmides, 1990). ...
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Levels of analysis are crucial to the progress of science. They frame the epistemological boundaries of a discipline, chart its explanatory goals, help scientists to avoid needless conflict, and highlight knowledge gaps. Two frameworks in particular, Tinbergen’s four questions from biology and Marr’s three levels from cognitive science, hold immense potential for psychology. This article proposes ways to integrate the two frameworks and suggests that doing so helps resolve key confusions and unnecessary conflicts in psychology. Integrating these two frameworks clarifies what “mechanism” really means, sheds light on how to test evolutionary hypotheses in psychology, and specifies what is required for a comprehensive explanation of a behavior or cognitive system. Adopting and integrating these two theoretical frameworks has the capacity to spur progress in psychology and to clarify what is needed for a comprehensive science of the mind.
... We would like to end by advancing a few novel handicap hypotheses in humans. It has been argued that, since immune function may be inversely related to disgust, people may downregulate their disgust in front of potential mates in order to convey a robust immune system (e.g., Al-Shawaf et al. 2015). Although it has not been framed as such, this is essentially a handicap hypothesis: individuals' decreased disgust exposes them to heightened risk of pathogens, thereby conveying reliable information about their health and immunity. ...
... Since Kahneman and Tversky's Perspective Theory and the risk-as-feeling hypothesis (Loewenstein, Weber, Hsee, & Welch, 2001), researchers have provided multiple pieces of evidence that negative affective states (e.g., fear) affect people more strongly than positive states (Gal & Rucker, 2018). From an ontological point of view, emotions emerged as responses to problems that needed to be solved (Al-Shawaf, Conroy-Beam, Asao, & Buss, 2016). It emphasizes the impact of emotions on behavior and assumes the motivational nature of emotional states. ...
... Until the middle of the twentieth century, the study of emotions consisted mostly of careful observation and description of psychological and neural proximate mechanisms, with a transition from generalizations to attention to individual differences (Griffiths, 1997;Lazarus, 1993;Wierzbicka, 2010). Recognition that natural selection shaped the capacities for emotions has transformed the field (Al-Shawaf & Shackelford, 2023;Al-Shawaf et al., 2016;Haselton & Ketelaar, 2006;Nesse, 1990;Plutchik, 1970;Tooby & Cosmides, 1990). The role of emotions for avoiding threats and pursuing rewards was earlier noted, but several additional principles provide a framework for considering pathology across the full range of emotions and for addressing the evolutionary medicine question of why emotions are so vulnerable to dysregulation (Nesse, 2005b(Nesse, , 2019a(Nesse, , 2023. ...
... The human brain is a complex neural network that provokes different reactions and behaviours in accordance with what they see, touch and feel (Al-Shawaf et al., 2016). The recent improvements in both hardware and software have fuelled a signi cant interest in the development of futuristic frameworks to promote the engagement level between the users and the systems. ...
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This research proposes an Engaging User Experience (ENUX) framework which caters for the influential User Experience (UX) and User Engagement (UE) dimensions for a MAR system. The ENUX framework extends on the UX and UE theoretical groundings, the multimodal and multisensory techniques and performance metrics to effectively enhance the UX and UE in MAR systems. Designers and developers in the MAR field have focused on providing a usable system rather than concentrating on a user-centric system that may lead to an enhanced UX and UE. The recommendations from the ENUX framework adopt a user-centered perspective to ensure a high-quality MAR experience in various application areas, and therefore can demonstrate the following: point of engagement, period of engagement, maximum engagement and re-engagement. An initial MAR prototype for a cultural heritage site has been developed using the instrumental, cognitive and sensory dimensions from the ENUX framework. A field study of sixty-six users has evaluated the MAR prototype to carry out an impact analysis of the contribution of the ENUX framework. The findings have confirmed that the partial development of the ENUX framework have significantly improved the UX and UE in the MAR prototype and is a promising start to implement the overall ENUX framework. The framework lays a solid foundation for the assessment of the UX and UE factors in MAR systems, which has the potential to assist the MAR system developers to identify and improve the most UX and UE influential factors in their systems.
... Evolved psychological adaptations are believed to be domain-specific, in that each mechanism has evolved during different periods of time to solve a specific adaptive challenge; and context-dependent, meaning that they remain dormant or inactive until elicited in response to specific internal or external cues (Schmitt & Pilcher, 2004). In addition, evolutionary theorists posit that the behavioral output produced by evolved psychological mechanisms are mediated by positive and negative affect, which are believed to be connected to the reward systems in the human brain (Al-Shawaf, Conroy-Beam, Asao, & Buss, 2015). In other words, physical and/or emotional pain are evolved mechanisms which respond to stimuli that have had a history of being detrimental to survival and reproduction; and rewarding physical sensations and positive affect are mechanisms which have evolved to respond to stimuli which have led to increased genetic fitness. ...
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This paper presents an investigation of social anxiety (SA) from an evolutionary psychological perspective and examines the possibility that SA represents an evolutionary mismatch between conditions present in ancestral environments and those in modern society. A proposal for future research that will add support for an evolutionary mismatch hypothesis of SA will also be discussed.
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The commentaries addressed various aspects of our account of historical myths. We respond by clarifying the evolutionary theory of coalitional psychology that underlies our claims (R1). This addresses concerns about the role of fitness interdependence in large groups (R2), cultural transmission processes (R3), alternative routes to nation-building (R4) and the role of proximal mechanisms (R5). Finally, we evaluate alternative theories (R6) and discuss directions for future research (R7).
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The study aimed to determine differences in selected parameters of women’s relationship quality depending on whether they already have children with their current partner and whether they are currently pregnant. The study included overall relationship satisfaction, attachment anxiety and avoidance, and jealousy. The following scales were used: the Couple Satisfaction Index CSI-32, the Experience in Close Relationships – Revised, and the Multidimensional Jealousy Scale. The participants were 274 non-pregnant women and 105 pregnant women who were in a romantic relationship at the time of the study. The analyses showed that relationship satisfaction was higher among pregnant women. In this group, lower attachment anxiety and attachment avoidance, as well as weaker cognitive jealousy were also observed. Overall relationship satisfaction was lower in the group of women who had children, although when considering pregnancy, it was found that pregnant women showed the same level of relationship satisfaction regardless of whether or not they already had offspring. The research largely confirmed the higher relationship quality among pregnant women and partially lower relationship quality among women with children. However, the differences in terms of jealousy turned out to be inconsistent with the assumptions. The study’s conclusions were discussed in relation to the existing literature.
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This article argues that understanding the primary functions of cognitive processes in our evolutionary past can help to develop effective cognitive enhancement methods. The adaptive problems our ancestors faced forged interconnected cognitive and motor mechanisms supporting various movement-based problem-solving processes. However, the physical and social challenges these cognitive-motor capacities originally evolved to address are no longer prevalent in modern societies. Consequently, many adaptive problem-solving mechanisms linked to a wide range of body movements are often underused and insufficiently developed in modern contexts, contributing to age-related cognitive decline. From this view, and considering current cognitive enhancement techniques such as cognitive training, neurostimulation, physical exercise, and combined cognitive and physical training, the present article introduces an evolutionary-inspired cognitive enhancement framework. This framework advocates for developing strategies and training methods that stimulate our evolved cognitive-motor adaptations. In particular, therapeutic interventions should incorporate adaptive problems and whole-body movement solutions into modern technologies and computer-based tasks.
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A new theory of cognitive biases, called error management theory (EMT), proposes that psychological mechanisms are designed to be predictably biased when the costs of false-positive and false-negative errors were asymmetrical over evolutionary history. This theory explains known phenomena such as men's overperception of women's sexual intent, and it predicts new biases in social inference such as women's underestimation of men's commitment. In Study 1 (N = 217), the authors documented the commitment underperception effect predicted by EMT. In Study 2 (N = 289), the authors replicated the commitment bias and documented a condition in which men's sexual overperception bias is corrected. Discussion contrasts EMT with the heuristics and biases approach and suggests additional testable hypotheses based on EMT.
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The authors explored the psychology of romantically attracting someone who is already in a relationship—what can be called the process of human mate poaching. In Study 1 ( N = 236), they found that attempts at poaching were relatively common and were linked with distinctive personality dispositions. Study 2 ( N = 220) documented that the perceived costs and benefits of poaching differed somewhat for men and women and depended on whether short-term or long-term poaching outcomes were targeted. Study 3 ( N = 453) found support for 5 evolution-based hypotheses about the perceived effectiveness of poaching tactics. Study 4 ( N = 333) found that poaching effectiveness was influenced by the type of relationship being encroached on—marital, dating, long distance, highly committed, just beginning, or about to end. Discussion focuses on the importance of placing mate poaching within the broader context of human sexual strategies. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
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Modern evolutionary psychology provides a cogent criterion for considering an emotion as "basic": Whether the emotion evolved to solve an adaptive problem tributary to reproduction. Criteria such as distinctive universal signals, presence in other primates, or contribution to survival are not relevant, even though some basic emotions have these properties. Abundant evidence suggests that sexual jealousy is properly considered a basic emotion, even though it lacks a distinct expressive signature, contributes to adaptive problems of mating rather than survival, and may or may not be present in other primates.
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Caution: The print version may differ in minor respects from this draft. Posted only for scholarly/educational use. Please contact the publisher directly for permission to reprint. Evolutionary psychology is an approach to the psychological sciences in which principles and results drawn from evolutionary biology, cognitive science, anthropology, and neuroscience are integrated with the rest of psychology in order to map human nature. By human nature, evolutionary psychologists mean the evolved, reliably developing, species-typical computational and neural architecture of the human mind and brain. According to this view, the functional components that comprise this architecture were designed by natural selection to solve adaptive problems faced by our hunter-gatherer ancestors, and to regulate behavior so that these adaptive problems were successfully addressed (for discussion, see Cosmides & Tooby, 1987, Tooby & Cosmides, 1992). Evolutionary psychology is not a specific subfield of psychology, such as the study of vision, reasoning, or social behavior. It is a way of thinking about psychology that can be applied to any topic within it -including the emotions. The analysis of adaptive problems that arose ancestrally has led evolutionary psychologists to apply the concepts and methods of the cognitive sciences to scores of topics that are relevant to the study of emotion, such as the cognitive processes that govern cooperation, sexual attraction, jealousy, aggression, parental love, friendship, romantic love, the aesthetics of landscape preferences, coalitional aggression, incest avoidance, disgust, predator avoidance, kinship, and family relations (for reviews, see Barkow, Cosmides, & Tooby, 1992; Crawford & Krebs, 1998; Daly & Wilson, 1988; Pinker, 1997). Indeed, a rich theory of the emotions naturally emerges out of the core principles of evolutionary psychology (Tooby 1985; Tooby & Cosmides, 1990a; see also Nesse, 1991). In this chapter we will (1) briefly state what we think emotions are and what adaptive problem they were designed to solve; (2) explain the evolutionary and cognitive principles that led us to this view; and (3) using this background, explicate in a more detailed way the design of emotion programs and the states they create.
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In two studies, we explore causal domains of envy and test predictions about whether it is sex differentiated in nature. Study 1 explored the contexts in which envy is most frequently experienced by men and women. Study 2 built on these results, explicitly testing predictions about sex differences in envy. The results provide needed insight into sex differences in envy and provide the basis for a deeper understanding of the function served by this unpleasant emotion.
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Most evolutionary theories of human mating have focused on the adaptive benefits of short-term mating for men. Men cannot pursue a strategy of short-term mating, however, without willing women. Existing empirical evidence suggests that some women engage in short-term mating some of the time and probably have done so recurrently over human evolutionary history. The current studies tested hypotheses about the potential benefits women might derive from engaging in one type of short-term mating — extra-pair liaisons — and the contexts in which they do so. These include resource hypotheses (e.g. immediate resource accrual), genetic hypotheses (e.g. having genetically diverse offspring), mate switching hypotheses (e.g. acquiring a better mate), mate skill acquisition hypotheses (e.g. mate preference clarification) and mate manipulation hypotheses (e.g. deterring a partner's future infidelity). These hypotheses were tested by examining the perceived likelihood that women would receive particular benefits through a short-term extra-pair mating (Study 1); the perceived magnitude of benefits if received (Study 2); the contexts in which women engage in short-term extra-pair mating (Study 3); and individual differences among women in proclivity to pursue short-term matings in their perceptions of benefits (Study 4). Most strongly supported across all four studies were the mate switching and resource acquisition hypotheses. Discussion focuses on the distinction between functions and beneficial effects of short-term mating, limitations of the current studies and the consequences of women's short-term mating strategies for the broader matrix of human mating.
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Emotions are discrete, automatic responses to universally shared, culture-specific and individual-specific events. The emotion terms, such as anger, fear, etcetera, denote a family of related states sharing at least 12 characteristics, which distinguish one emotion family from another, as well as from other affective states. These affective responses are preprogrammed and involuntary, but are also shaped by life experiences.
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Although research on the nonverbal expression of emotion has played a prominent role throughout psychology during the past two decades—including an instrumental role in the development of contemporary evolutionary psychology—little research has focused on the evolutionary origins and functions of the emotional expressions themselves. However, recent findings from psychophysical, comparative, social, and cross-cultural psychology are converging to produce a compelling functionalist account, suggesting that emotional expressions serve critical adaptive purposes. Most of these studies have narrowly focused on single emotions—an approach that has been very useful for providing new insights about specific expressions but not for developing a broader understanding of why humans universally display and recognize distinct emotions. Here we unify these disparate findings in order to illuminate this fundamental form of social communication.
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Predation has long been implicated as a major selective force in the evolution of several morphological and behavioral characteristics of animals. The importance of predation during evolutionary time is clear, but growing evidence suggests that animals also have the ability to assess and behaviorally influence their risk of being preyed upon in ecological time (i.e., during their lifetime). We develop an abstraction of the predation process in which several components of predation risk are identified. A review of the literature indicates that an animal's ability to assess and behaviorally control one or more of these components strongly influences decision making in feeding animals, as well as in animals deciding when and how to escape predators, when and how to be social, or even, for fishes, when and how to breathe air. This review also reveals that such decision making reflects apparent trade-offs between the risk of predation and the benefits to be gained from engaging in a given activity. Despite this body of evidence, several areas in the study of animal behavior have received little or no attention from a predation perspective. We identify several such areas, the most important of which is that dealing with animal reproduction. Much work also remains regarding the precise nature of the risk of predation and how it is actually perceived by animals, and the extent to which they can behaviorally control their risk of predation. Mathematical models will likely play a major role in future work, and we suggest that modelers strive to consider the potential complexity in behavioral responses to predation risk. Overall, since virtually every animal is potential prey for others, research that seriously considers the influence of predation risk will provide significant insight into the nature of animal behavior.
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In species with internal female fertilization, males risk both lowered paternity probability and investment in rival gametes if their mates have sexual contact with other males. Females of such species do not risk lowered maternity probability through partner infidelity, but they do risk the diversion of their mates' commitment and resources to rival females. Three studies tested the hypothesis that sex differences in jealousy emerged in humans as solutions to the respective adaptive problems faced by each sex. In Study 1, men and women selected which event would upset them more—a partner's sexual infidelity or emotional infidelity. Study 2 recorded physiological responses (heart rate, electrodermal response, corrugator supercilii contraction) while subjects imagined separately the two types of partner infidelity. Study 3 tested the effect of being in a committed sexual relationship on the activation of jealousy. All studies showed large sex differences, confirming hypothesized sex linkages in jealousy activation.
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Anthropologists have long recognized that cultural evolution critically depends on the transmission and generation of information. However, between the selection pressures of evolution and the actual behaviour of individuals, scientists have suspected that other processes are at work. With the advent of what has come to be known as the cognitive revolution, psychologists are now exploring the evolved problem-solving and information-processing mechanisms that allow humans to absorb and generate culture. The purpose of this book is to introduce the newly crystallizing field of evolutionary psychology, which supplied the necessary connection between the underlying evolutionary biology and the complex and irreducible social phenomena studied by anthropologists, sociologists, economists, and historians.
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Anthropologists have long recognized that cultural evolution critically depends on the transmission and generation of information. However, between the selection pressures of evolution and the actual behaviour of individuals, scientists have suspected that other processes are at work. With the advent of what has come to be known as the cognitive revolution, psychologists are now exploring the evolved problem-solving and information-processing mechanisms that allow humans to absorb and generate culture. The purpose of this book is to introduce the newly crystallizing field of evolutionary psychology, which supplied the necessary connection between the underlying evolutionary biology and the complex and irreducible social phenomena studied by anthropologists, sociologists, economists, and historians.
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Anthropologists have long recognized that cultural evolution critically depends on the transmission and generation of information. However, between the selection pressures of evolution and the actual behaviour of individuals, scientists have suspected that other processes are at work. With the advent of what has come to be known as the cognitive revolution, psychologists are now exploring the evolved problem-solving and information-processing mechanisms that allow humans to absorb and generate culture. The purpose of this book is to introduce the newly crystallizing field of evolutionary psychology, which supplied the necessary connection between the underlying evolutionary biology and the complex and irreducible social phenomena studied by anthropologists, sociologists, economists, and historians.
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Available again, an influential book that offers a framework for understanding visual perception and considers fundamental questions about the brain and its functions. David Marr's posthumously published Vision (1982) influenced a generation of brain and cognitive scientists, inspiring many to enter the field. In Vision, Marr describes a general framework for understanding visual perception and touches on broader questions about how the brain and its functions can be studied and understood. Researchers from a range of brain and cognitive sciences have long valued Marr's creativity, intellectual power, and ability to integrate insights and data from neuroscience, psychology, and computation. This MIT Press edition makes Marr's influential work available to a new generation of students and scientists. In Marr's framework, the process of vision constructs a set of representations, starting from a description of the input image and culminating with a description of three-dimensional objects in the surrounding environment. A central theme, and one that has had far-reaching influence in both neuroscience and cognitive science, is the notion of different levels of analysis—in Marr's framework, the computational level, the algorithmic level, and the hardware implementation level. Now, thirty years later, the main problems that occupied Marr remain fundamental open problems in the study of perception. Vision provides inspiration for the continuing efforts to integrate knowledge from cognition and computation to understand vision and the brain.
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Evidence on the coherence between emotion and facial expression in adults from laboratory experiments is reviewed. High coherence has been found in several studies between amusement and smiling; low to moderate coherence between other positive emotions and smiling. The available evidence for surprise and disgust suggests that these emotions are accompanied by their "traditional" facial expressions, and even components of these expressions, only in a minority of cases. Evidence concerning sadness, anger, and fear is very limited. For sadness, one study suggests that high emotion-expression coherence may exist in specific situations, whereas for anger and fear, the evidence points to low coherence. Insufficient emotion intensity and inhibition of facial expressions seem unable to account for the observed dissociations between emotion and facial expression.
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Evidence does not support the claim that observers universally recognize basic emotions from signals on the face. The percentage of observers who matched the face with the predicted emotion (matching score) is not universal, but varies with culture and language. Matching scores are also inflated by the commonly used methods: within-subject design; posed, exaggerated facial expressions (devoid of context); multiple examples of each type of expression; and a response format that funnels a variety of interpretations into one word specified by the experimenter. Without these methodological aids, matching scores are modest and subject to various explanations.
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Why are animal signals reliable? This is the central problem for evolutionary biologists interested in signals. Of course, not all signals are reliable; but most are, otherwise receivers of signals would ignore them. A number of theoretical answers have been proposed and empirical studies made, but there still remains a considerable amount of confusion. The authors, one a theoretician the other a fieldworker, introduce a sense of order to this chaos. A significant cause of confusion has been the tendency for different researchers to use either the same term with different meanings, or different terms with the same meaning. The authors attempt to clarify these differences. A second cause of confusion has arisen because many biologists continue to assume that there is only one correct explanation for signal reliability. The authors argue that the reliability of signals is maintained in several ways, relevant in different circumstances, and that biologists must learn to distinguish between them. In this book they explain the different theories, give examples of signalling systems to which one or another theory applies, and point to the many areas where further work, both theoretical and empirical, is required. John Maynard Smith is one of the most influential scientists of his generation and his theories have transformed our understanding of animal behaviour, whilst David Harper is a reknowned field ecologist. Animal signals are one of the hottest and most controversial subjects in animal behaviour, and are also of major importance to an understanding of human behaviour and the evolution of language.
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The handicap principle, first proposed by Zahavi about 17 years ago, has in the past several years become widely accepted as a central unifying theory explaining many previously baffling aspects of animal signalling and communication. It is arguably the most important theoretical advance in animal behaviour in recent years. Basically, the theory states that to be effective, signals must be reliable, and to be reliable, they must be costly to the signaller. This fundamental insight is then developed to explain and illuminate much of animal and human behaviour - why the peacock’s tail is so ornate, and why antelope will spend energy stetting or leaping into the air, when they see a predator, instead of running away, but also how humans test each others’ commitment by imposing burdens during courtship. Signals are paid attention to only if the signal itself imposes a handicap on the signaller that would make cheating impossible or unprofitable, This book explores the very wide-ranging implications of the handicap principle, for predator-prey relations, sexual selection, parent-offspring relations, coalitions and alliances, and the persistence of altruism, in animals and also in human societies and intercellular signalling within multicellular organisms.
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We tested the prediction derived from the evolutionary view of jealousy that men preferentially recall cues to sexual infidelity, whereas women preferentially recall cues to emotional infidelity. This preferential recall was predicted to be more pronounced in a personally more threatening than in a personally less threatening context condition. In the personally less threatening context condition, the participants listened to a story about an anonymous couple spending an evening together; in the personally more threatening context condition, the same story referred to one's own romantic relationship. Integrated in this story were five ambiguous cues each to sexual and emotional infidelity. As predicted, in a surprise recall test, men preferentially recalled cues to sexual infidelity, whereas women preferentially recalled cues to emotional infidelity. This preferential recall was significant for both men and women only in the personally more threatening context condition.
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This reference work provides broad and up-to-date coverage of the major perspectives - ethological, neurobehavioral, developmental, dynamic systems, componential - on facial expression. It reviews Darwin's legacy in the theories of Izard and Tomkins and in Fridlund's recently proposed Behavioral Ecology theory. It explores continuing controversies on universality and innateness. It also updates the research guidelines of Ekman, Friesen and Ellsworth. This book anticipates emerging research questions: what is the role of culture in children's understanding of faces? In what precise ways do faces depend on the immediate context? What is the ecology of facial expression: when do different expressions occur and in what frequency? The Psychology of Facial Expressions is aimed at students, researchers and educators in psychology anthropology, and sociology who are interested in the emotive and communicative uses of facial expression.
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In the current resurgence of interest in the biological basis of animal behavior and social organization, the ideas and questions pursued by Charles Darwin remain fresh and insightful. This is especially true of The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex, Darwin's second most important work. This edition is a facsimile reprint of the first printing of the first edition (1871), not previously available in paperback. The work is divided into two parts. Part One marshals behavioral and morphological evidence to argue that humans evolved from other animals. Darwin shoes that human mental and emotional capacities, far from making human beings unique, are evidence of an animal origin and evolutionary development. Part Two is an extended discussion of the differences between the sexes of many species and how they arose as a result of selection. Here Darwin lays the foundation for much contemporary research by arguing that many characteristics of animals have evolved not in response to the selective pressures exerted by their physical and biological environment, but rather to confer an advantage in sexual competition. These two themes are drawn together in two final chapters on the role of sexual selection in humans. In their Introduction, Professors Bonner and May discuss the place of The Descent in its own time and relation to current work in biology and other disciplines.
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Historically, the hypothesis driving emotion research has been that emotion’s data-base—in language, physiology, and behavior— is organized around specific mental states, as reflected in evaluative language. It is suggested that this approach has not greatly advanced a natural science of emotion and that the developing motivational model of emotion defines a better path: emotion is an evolved trait founded on motivational neural circuitry shared by mammalian species, primitively prompting heightened perceptual processing and reflex mobilization for action to appetitive or threatening survival cues. As the field moves forward with increasingly sophisticated measurement technology and assessing more complex affective functioning, scientific understanding of human emotion will proceed best within the framework of this mammalian brain model.
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We tested the prediction derived from the evolutionary view of jealousy that men preferentially recall cues to sexual infidelity, whereas women preferentially recall cues to emotional infidelity. This preferential recall was predicted to be more pronounced in a personally more threatening than in a personally less threatening context condition. In the personally less threatening context condition, the participants listened to a story about an anonymous couple spending an evening together; in the personally more threatening context condition, the same story referred to one's own romantic relationship. Integrated in this story were five ambiguous cues each to sexual and emotional infidelity. As predicted, in a surprise recall test, men preferentially recalled cues to sexual infidelity, whereas women preferentially recalled cues to emotional infidelity. This preferential recall was significant for both men and women only in the personally more threatening context condition.
Article
Two experiments test the prediction derived from the evolutionary view of jealousy that men are particularly concerned with a mate’s sexual infidelity and women with a mate’s emotional infidelity. Experiment 1 examines sex differences with respect to the information men and women actively request from their partner when suspecting her or his infidelity. Experiment 2 tests the hypothesis that within a heterosexual romantic relationship men are more occupied with thoughts about a mate’s sexual infidelity, whereas women are more occupied with thoughts about a mate’s emotional infidelity. The results of both experiments support the evolutionary view of sex-specific jealousy mechanisms. The implications of the present findings are discussed.