The Lakatosian perspective The article starts off by providing a fantastic definition of what Evolutionary Psychology is: “… the application of the principles and knowledge of evolutionary biology to psychological theory and research” and posits that the, “central assumption” of Evolutionary Psychology is that, “the human brain is comprised of a large number of specialized mechanisms that were shaped by natural selection over vast periods of time to solve the recurrent information-processing problems faced by our ancestors” (Ketelaar and Ellis 2000). These problems could include things from selecting what foods to eat, negotiating social hierarchies, and selecting mates.
There are some critics of Evolutionary Theory who claim that it is not …show more content…
In other words, it’s a “tool” that is utilized in servicing the larger program of research that is centered around the metatheory (Ketelaar and Ellis 2000). The protective belt is composed of middle-level theories, hypotheses, and predictions, with the middle-level theories serving as the link between metatheory to more specific hypotheses and predictions. For instance, men’s jealousy seems to be centrally related to sexual infidelity, while a women’s jealousy is centered around loss of commitment and investment because men tend to be less invested in their children than women because they only really need to give their sperm for the baby come in to …show more content…
The first, explanatory power, means that, “it solves more of the existing puzzles and accounts for a wider range of known facts” (Ketelaar and Ellis 2000). Predictive power on the other hand, means that a theory, “better anticipates the data by specifying previously unobserved phenomena” (Ketelaar and Ellis 2000), meaning that the theory predicts things based off of new material. There are also two types of success when talking about a theory. Confirmational success is when the, “pertinent statements of the theory” are supported by empirical data (Ketelaar and Ellis 2000). Disconfirmational success on the other hand, means that a theory has withstood several attempts of falsification and has proved itself as a viable
There are some critics of Evolutionary Theory who claim that it is not …show more content…
In other words, it’s a “tool” that is utilized in servicing the larger program of research that is centered around the metatheory (Ketelaar and Ellis 2000). The protective belt is composed of middle-level theories, hypotheses, and predictions, with the middle-level theories serving as the link between metatheory to more specific hypotheses and predictions. For instance, men’s jealousy seems to be centrally related to sexual infidelity, while a women’s jealousy is centered around loss of commitment and investment because men tend to be less invested in their children than women because they only really need to give their sperm for the baby come in to …show more content…
The first, explanatory power, means that, “it solves more of the existing puzzles and accounts for a wider range of known facts” (Ketelaar and Ellis 2000). Predictive power on the other hand, means that a theory, “better anticipates the data by specifying previously unobserved phenomena” (Ketelaar and Ellis 2000), meaning that the theory predicts things based off of new material. There are also two types of success when talking about a theory. Confirmational success is when the, “pertinent statements of the theory” are supported by empirical data (Ketelaar and Ellis 2000). Disconfirmational success on the other hand, means that a theory has withstood several attempts of falsification and has proved itself as a viable