What is Evolutionary Psychology?

Evolutionary psychology believes that the human mind (Mind) is a set of information processing devices. These devices are formed by natural selection. The purpose is to deal with the adaptation problems encountered by our ancestors in the survival process such as hunting. It is a research idea that integrates biology, psychology, and social science.

Evolutionary psychology believes that the human mind (Mind) is a set of information processing devices. These devices are formed by natural selection. The purpose is to deal with the adaptation problems encountered by our ancestors in the survival process such as hunting. It is a research idea that integrates biology, psychology, and social science.

Chinese name

Evolutionary psychology

Foreign name

Evolutionarypsychology

Applied discipline

psychology

Application range

Developmental psychology

Overview of Evolutionary Psychology

Evolutionary psychology was born in the 1980s. The main representatives are David Buss, Jerome HBarkow, Ledaosmides, and John Tooby. Evolutionary psychology believes that the human mind (Mind) is a set of information processing devices. These devices are formed by natural selection. The purpose is to deal with the adaptation problems encountered by our ancestors in the survival process such as hunting.

It is a science that integrates research ideas from biology, psychology, and social sciences. Evolutionary psychology is a combination of the principles of modern psychology and evolutionary biology. It attempts to use the perspective of evolution to deeply study and study the origin and nature of human psychology and some social phenomena. The emergence of evolutionary psychology has won such beautiful words as "evolutionary psychology: a new science of psychology", "new paradigm of psychological integration", "new orientation of psychological development".

Evolutionary psychology content

(1) The past is the key to understanding psychological mechanisms

Evolutionary psychology believes that the mind of a modern human has a long history of evolution. Therefore, the past is the key to understanding the present. "Past" here refers not only to the history of individual growth, but also to the evolutionary history of human germline. 99% of the evolutionary history of human ancestors occurred during the Pleistocene hunting --- collection era. This long history of evolution has brought a long history of accumulation to our psychology. In today's human psychology, there are still traces left by a long history. Every living person today is a product of evolution. As "living fossils", they can help us understand the past of our ancestors.

(2) Functional decomposition is an important way to explore psychological mechanisms

Evolutionary psychology claims that to understand the psychology, we must first understand what adaptation problems these psychological mechanisms are used to solve. Only by understanding the functions of these psychological phenomena can we have a clear understanding of their mechanisms. As far as methodological procedures are concerned, the explanation procedure of evolutionary psychology has the following points: first, by analyzing the work or tasks performed by a certain psychology to reveal the function of this psychology; A psychological mechanism behind a function; third, trace the evolutionary history and selection history of these mechanisms to their ultimate roots; finally, explain the psychological phenomenon according to the mechanism and the ultimate cause.

(3) Psychology is a series of adaptors

Psychology is "applied to our hunting --- collection generation evolved from the evolutionary process of ancestors." The role of natural selection is to test alternative mental designs by repeatedly encountering recurring situations (long-standing adaptation problems) in evolution to determine which designs are selected and passed on to future generations. In our evolutionary history, compared to other alternative designs, those design changes that have enhanced their own ability to survive and reproduce have been selected.

(4) The psychological mechanism is modular

Evolutionary psychology believes that human psychology has modularity. Psychology contains modules that are specific to many domains. A module only deals with content-specific information that is compatible with its specific function. In other words, the module is a special "calculation" mechanism, which only calculates those specific inputs and only focuses on the information related to its special processing capabilities. For example, Cosmides likens psychology to a "Swiss Army Knife", which includes different tools, each of which can accomplish a specific task. Human psychology is also assembled by some cognitive tools, each of which has a specific function.

(5) Human behavior is the result of interaction between psychological mechanism and environment

Psychological mechanism is an extremely important factor in explaining human social behavior. In explaining human behavior through psychological mechanisms, the role of the environment cannot be ignored, but the environment plays a secondary role here. Evolutionary psychologists oppose environmental determinism. In their eyes, the role of the environment is only to act as a background factor to activate the psychological mechanism, so that the organism behaves. All explicit behaviors are the result of interactions between background input and psychological mechanisms. ^[1]