PSYC1111 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Collectivism, Evolutionary Psychology, Libido
Document Summary
Evolutionary psychology-> study of the evolution of behavior and the mind, using natural selection. Men look for health and fertility because it increases their chances of sending genes into the future: we are genetically predisposed to act in ways that would produce children, grandchildren, and beyond. Normal stimulation during early years is critical, but brain"s development doesn"t end with childhood: brain has plasticity -> neural tissue is ever changing and reorganizing in response to new experiences. Critics say there is weakness in evolutionary psychology"s explanation of our mating preferences. They say psychologists start with an effect and work backward to explain what happened. Say that people learn social scripts -> culture"s guide to acting in certain situations. Think: nature via nurture -> genes affect how people react to and influence us. Genes, when expressed in specific environments, influence developmental differences. Rosenzweig + krech (1962) put rats into either 1) solitary confinement or 2) communal playground.
