Evolutionary Psychology

Front 1

Change in organic structure over time

Back 1

Evolution

Front 2

The principle that, among the range of inherited trait variations, those that lead to increased survival will most likely be passed on to succeeding generations

Back 2

Natural Selection

Front 3

Three main points of natural selection

Back 3

1. Variation
2. Inheritance
3. Selection

Front 4

The principle that, among the range of
inherited trait variations, those that lead to successful mating will be passed on to succeeding generations

Back 4

Sexual Selection

Front 5

Competition between members of the same sex leading to increased access to mates

Back 5

Intrasexual Competition

Front 6

Preferential mate choice – individuals with qualities that are preferred by the opposite sex are more likely to
reproduce.

Back 6

Intersexual Selection

Front 7

Random changes in the genetic makeup of a population

Back 7

Genetic Drift

Front 8

Random change in the DNA

Back 8

Mutations

Front 9

Small portion of a population establishes a new colony (the
founders are not genetically representative of the entire
population)

Back 9

Founder Effect

Front 10

A small portion of the population survives some catastrophe
(again survivors are not genetically representative of the entire
population)

Back 10

Genetic bottlenecks

Front 11

Inheritance is particulate True/False

Back 11

True

Front 12

The smallest discrete unit that is inherited by
offspring intact

Back 12

Gene

Front 13

Who discovered Ethology?

Back 13

Konrad Lorenz

Front 14

an optimal period shortly after birth when an organism’s exposure to
certain stimuli or experiences produces proper development

Back 14

Critical Period

Front 15

the process by which certain animals form attachments during a critical
period very early in life

Back 15

Imprinting

Front 16

Tinbergen’s Four Why’s

Back 16

1. The immediate influence of behavior
(proximate cause)
2. Developmental Influences
3. Function (or adaptive purpose)
4. Evolutionary origins (ultimate cause)

Front 17

Who came up with the theory of Inclusive Fitness?

Back 17

Hamilton

Front 18

The effects of an
individual’s actions on
the reproductive
success of genetic
relatives weighted by
the degree of genetic
relatedness.

Back 18

Inclusive Fitness

Front 19

What did Triver's come up with?

Back 19

• Reciprocal Altruism
• Parental Investment
• Parent-Offspring Conflict

Front 20

persistence of learning over time
through the storage and retrieval of
information

Back 20

Memory

Front 21

Focus on the
usefulness of
consciousness and the
utility of behavior

Back 21

Functionalism

Front 22

Questions that can be answered with
information/knowledge gained through observation
and experimentation (evidence)

Back 22

Empirical questions

Front 23

The most important characteristic of a good
research idea is that it is

Back 23

Testable

Front 24

an explanation using an integrated set of
principles that organizes and predicts
observations

Back 24

Theory

Front 25

Inherited and reliably developing characteristic that came into
existence through natural selection because they helped to
solve problems of survival or reproduction better than
alternative designs existing in the population during the period
of their evolution

Back 25

Adaptations

Front 26

Characteristics that do not solve adaptive problems and do not
have functional design; they are “carried along” with
characteristics that do have functional design because they
happen to be coupled with those adaptations

Back 26

By-products

Front 27

Random effects produced by forces such as chance
mutations, sudden and unprecedented changes in the
environment, or chance effects during development

Back 27

Noise

Front 28

5 ingredients to Adaptations

Back 28

– Function
– Efficiency
– Economy
– Precision
- Reliability

Front 29

The statistical composite of selection
pressures that occurred during an
adaptation’s period of evolution responsible
for producing the adaptation

Back 29

Environment of Evolutionary
Adaptedness (EEA)

Front 30

Three levels of evolutionary analysis

Back 30

• General Evolutionary Theory
• Middle-Level Evolutionary Theories
• Specific Evolutionary Hypotheses

Front 31

Top down strategy is driven by what?

Back 31

Theory

Front 32

Bottom up strategy is driven by what?

Back 32

Observation

Front 33

Definition of an Evolved
Psychological Mechanism
1. An evolved psychological mechanism exists in the form that
it does because it solved a specific problem of survival or
reproduction recurrently over evolutionary history
2. An evolved psychological mechanism is designed to take in
only a narrow slice of information
3. The input of an evolved psychological mechanism tells an
organism the particular adaptive problem it is facing
4. The input of an evolved psychological mechanism is
transformed through decision rules into output
5. The output of an evolved psychological mechanism can be
physiological activity, information to other psychological
mechanisms, or manifest behavior
6. The output of an evolved psychological mechanism is
directed toward the solution to a specific adaptive problem
Input
Decision Rules
IF

Back 33

Definition of an Evolved
Psychological Mechanism
1. An evolved psychological mechanism exists in the form that
it does because it solved a specific problem of survival or
reproduction recurrently over evolutionary history
2. An evolved psychological mechanism is designed to take in
only a narrow slice of information
3. The input of an evolved psychological mechanism tells an
organism the particular adaptive problem it is facing
4. The input of an evolved psychological mechanism is
transformed through decision rules into output
5. The output of an evolved psychological mechanism can be
physiological activity, information to other psychological
mechanisms, or manifest behavior
6. The output of an evolved psychological mechanism is
directed toward the solution to a specific adaptive problem
Input
Decision Rules
IF

Front 34

Methods for Testing Evolutionary
Hypotheses

Back 34

• Comparing Different Species
• Compare Males and Females
• Compare individuals within a species
• Compare same individuals in different
contexts
• Experimental Methods

Front 35

converging
evidence

Back 35

evidence from two or more methods and sources of data

Front 36

Men hunt not to provide for own family but
to gain status benefits of sharing their
bounty with neighbors

Back 36

Show-off Hypothesis

Front 37

Explains why humans live where they live

Back 37

The Savanna Hypothesis

Front 38

Three Stages of Habitat Selection

Back 38

• Selection
• Information gathering
• Exploitation

Front 39

Ways In Combating Predators & Other
Environmental Dangers

Back 39

• Freeze
• Flight
• Fight
• Submit
• Fright
• Faint

Front 40

The deterioration of all bodily mechanisms as
organisms grow older

Back 40

Theory of Senescence

Front 41

A gene can have two or more different effects

Back 41

Pleiotropy