Evolutionary Theory

Understanding human behavior has always been the primary objective of many scholars and researchers as it helps in identifying many different attributes and traits of humans, which effect human performance. Accordingly, the paper under consideration “Applying evolutionary theory to human behavior: past differences and current debates” by Gillian R. Brown and Peter R. Richerson, focuses on the evolutionary theory with the help of three sub fields, which are evolutionary psychology, human behavioral psychology and cultural evolution. All these theories present an intersection of psychology, biology and anthropology respectively. Human behavior has been reflected differently by these three theories as human behavioral psychology projects that human behavior is a reflection of optimum capability of individuals, whereas evolutionary psychology reveals that there is a clear mismatch …show more content…
These theories are no longer independent or pertain to different school of thoughts, which has also been agreed upon by many researchers working in the field of psychology. Human behavior has emerged as a complex topic that is difficult to counter through cultural evolution or biological evolution alone. The intricate role of human genes in developing human behavior is yet to understand as the variable under consideration cannot be easily tested independently. Other variables such as individual learning and social development of human brain and personal character also effect the human behavior, while researchers test the role of genes. Accordingly, the researchers have found it much easier and convenient to determine the compounding effect of all such variables on human behavior as they are interrelated to each other. For this reason, the simultaneous use of all these theories is beneficial for decoding further attributes of human behavior in the field of