PSYCH 1XX3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Soltyrei, Microevolution, Sanderling
5 May 2015
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Document Summary
Higher mental processes: selective attention, memory encoding, and memory retrieval, they refer to the adaptive functions of mental activity. Occurs over successive generations when one trait is more favorable than another. Eventually the entire population contains only the most favored trait: stabilizing selection: Selection against any sort of departure from the species typical adaptive design: darwin"s finches: After the drought was over and plants produced smaller seeds again, the average beak depth of the finches returned to pre-drought sizes. However, sometimes changes that arise through natural selection are more permanent and form a potential foundation for diversification of related species. What natural selection favors is not simply those individuals who are best at surviving. The tail is no help with respect to physical survival - it"s energetically expensive and makes it harder for him to escape predators. However, darwinian fitness isn"t a matter of survival but rather reproduction.
