Exam 2 Flashcards

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1
Q

What is optimal foraging theory? How successful is it in explaining foraging patterns?

A
  • natural selection designed humans to maximize their rate of energy return relative to the amount of time they spend foraging
  • research shows ppl make rational decisions much of the time - stop collecting a resource when it reduces the average rate of return for all resources combined
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2
Q

According to optimal foraging theory, what is search time, handling/processing time, opportunity costs?

A
  • search time: time it takes to search for plants and animals to eat
  • handling/processing time: time it takes to dig up,cut down plants, get them ready to eat; also includes time spent tracking, killing and butchering animals
  • opportunity costs: time spent searching for one type of food leaves less time to find other types of food
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3
Q

What are the exceptions to optimal foraging theory? Do they make sense in light of evolution?

A
  • strong preference for meat
  • sometimes men pass on plants to hunt for game, even when rate of return is lower
  • evolution explan: nutritional advantage to meat, way achieve status (hunters tend to have higher status leading to better mating opportunities)
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4
Q

What are the strategies ppl use to “make a living”?

A
  • hunting/gathering: exclusive until about 10,000 yrsa ago, bands of no more than 100 individuals, frequent move camps, food storage rare
  • cultivating crops
  • herding animals
  • making goods and selling them
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5
Q

How often do hunter gatherers move camp? Why is there variability in this?

A
  • varies, depending on the region they inhabit (ex. 50x a year vs. 2x a year)
  • also changing of the seasons and what resources are available to them
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6
Q

What percent of food comes from hunting? Gathering? How does it relate to latitude?

A
  • latitude relates to the availability of diff types of food
  • closer to equator about half from gathering (50-60ish)
  • further from equator much more than half from hunting/fishing
  • as latitude increases, reliance on hunting and fishing increases
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7
Q

In hunter-gatherer societies, who hunts and who gathers? Why?

A
  • men do hunting, women gather
  • why women don’t hunt: women much more important to survival of offspring (carry child, feed child, pregnancy) takes them away from child for period of time
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8
Q

What are the benefits of being a good hunter?

A
  • aside from the nutritional advantage

- good hunters (men) have higher social status and are preferred as mates

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9
Q

What is the Provisioning Hypothesis?

A
  • transition from foraging to large game hunting provided major impetus for human evolution including toolmaking & use, development of large brains, complex language used to communicate w/ other hunters
  • meat is full of energy, benefits brought to men who provide meat for their families
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10
Q

What is the support for the provisioning hypothesis/ what does it explain?

A
  • strong male coalitions
  • reciprocal altruism & social exchange: help someone at cost to yourself and they may return the favor at another time
  • division of labor: better for women to be with young children
  • emergence of stone tools
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11
Q

What is the Showoff Hypothesis? What support is there for this idea?

A
  • hypothesis: women prefer to have neighbors who are showoffs (go after rare large game, women benefit by getting some of the meat)
  • women reward men who do this by favoring them, siding with them during disputes, having sex with them
  • not all men good at hunting; takes years to perfect
  • good hunters are preferred by women (higher social status preferred as mates; women may withhold sex if male doesnt bring home meat)
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12
Q

What is the Gathering Hypothesis? What is the benefit of this view? Can it explain as much as the provisioning hypothesis?

A
  • hypothesis: securing plant food through use of stone tools provided the primary evolutionary impetus for the emergence of modern humans (hunting became important later)
  • corrects view that centers solely on men
  • accounts for primate relatives having diets coming mostly from foraging
  • does not account for division of labor
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13
Q

Is the claim that hunter-gatherers are “affluent” (meaning they don’t have many needs) true?

A
  • not true
  • spend about 28 hrs foraging
  • about 46 hrs a week of work (making/repairing tools/weapons, processing foods, fathering wood)
  • ppl undernourished
  • food anxiety
  • high infant mortality rate
  • infectious disease
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14
Q

When and where did agriculture develop? What plants and animals were domesticated?

A
  • about 10,000-11,500 yrs ago in fertile crescent
  • wheat, barley, rye, peas, lentils
  • sheep, goats, cattle, pigs
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15
Q

What’s the possible adaptation for being sick during pregnancy?

A
  • nausea & vomiting give protection from harmful effects of toxins and pathogens (vomiting expels pathogens; nausea learn to avoid)
  • also encourage to avoid pathogenic food
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16
Q

What foods have the highest aversions for pregnant women?

A
  • meat, eggs, coffee, alcohol, broccoli, brussel sprouts, cabbage
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17
Q

When are women sickest? What is the significance of this?

A
  • sickest during 1st trimester
  • significant bc fetus very vulnerable in this stage and mother’s immune system is vulnerable in this period (suppressed)
  • progesterone stimulates decrease in NK cells
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18
Q

Do women feel only heightened disgust or are some good smells heightened as well?

A
  • increased olfactory acuity overall
  • find some odors less pleasant
  • find some odors like fruit and flowers more pleasant
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19
Q

Why do moms lower their immune system during early pregnancy? What impact does this have on pregnancy sickness?

A
  • early on immune system is suppressed bc body interprets fetus as foreign body therefore suppresses immune system to keep from attacking
  • immune response at lowest level when women experience sickness
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20
Q

What does cross-cultural evidence show about pregnancy sickness?

A
  • sickness appears to be widespread; in some cultures is the first outward sign of pregnancy recognized
  • lower levels of sickness in places that eat less meat (meat often contains toxins)
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21
Q

Why are babies born so early?

A
  • large heads have to fit through woman’s pelvis
22
Q

What is altricial?

A
  • at birth young are poorly developed; helpless
23
Q

Why is the human pelvis so small?

A
  • bc of bipedal locomotion
24
Q

Why is it that food in lower latitudes is more spicy?

A
  • spices used in places where food spoils more quickly

- spices help to kill bacteria

25
Q

What is the function of disgust?

A
  • disgust at potentially dangerous substances may keep us from getting sick
26
Q

What is behavioral prophylaxis?

A
  • we perform behaviors to avoid diseases

- these behaviors prevent illness

27
Q

Explain the Red Queen Principle

A
  • another phrase for evolutionary arms race
  • fitness increase in one evolutionary system tends to lead to fitness decrease in another system
  • only way that a species involved in a competition can maintain its fitness relative to the others is by in turn improving its design
28
Q

What is an evolutionary arms race?

A
  • co-evolution between organisms in conflict

- ex. hosts & parasites, predator & prey

29
Q

What do humans do to increase pathogen virulence? How can we reduce the virulence of pathogens?

A
  • we put evolutionary pressure on microbes for them to evolve and become more resistant
  • force pathogens to spread through routes that make them less severe
30
Q

What is the general function of emotion?

A
  • adaptations shaped by natural selection
  • specialized - help us to respond effectively
  • protect us from harm (ex. disgust keeps us from ingesting dangerous substances)
31
Q

What is the information threat theory of shame?

A
  • shame evolved to manage the recurrent threat of devaluation due to adverse info reaching others
  • status within a group is important - valued individuals receive help while being less valuable others may seek to harm you & give less help
32
Q

What does shame motivate people to do?

A
  • social withdrawal
  • accept subordination
  • appeasement behavior
  • more cooperation
  • nonverbal display
33
Q

What things are most shameful?

A
  • things that others view as most negative
34
Q

What is the function of anger?

A
  • a bargaining tactic to resolve conflicts in favor of the angry individual
  • 2 negotiating tactics of inflicting costs and/or withholding benefits
35
Q

From an EP perspective, what function does anxiety serve? Why do levels change? Is lack of anxiety a disorder?

A
  • in face of a threat, anxiety alters thinking, behavior, and physiology in advantageous ways (fight or flight response)
  • changes bc uses calories & energy, potentially damage tissue
  • lack of anxiety may cause ppl to get into dangerous situations (death)
36
Q

What might depression signal?

A
  • signals maladaptive behavior
37
Q

What is costly signaling theory? What is an honest signal?

A
  • elaborate displays evolve as honest signals about underlying phenotypic & genotypic qualities of their bearers
  • honest signals give off info which increases fitness of receiver (these signals may be costly so that individuals can only produce them when they are “fit”)
38
Q

What is the function of humor?

A
  • promote bonding
  • facilitate cooperation
  • signal of being non-threatening
  • court mates
39
Q

What does it mean that humor may be sexually selected?

Who prefers humor and why?

A
  • may reveal good genetic qualities (reveals intelligence, creativity)
  • related to IQ
  • humor increases men’s attractiveness, and men like women who appreciate their humor
40
Q

What is the function of maternal love?

A
  • motivates caring for helpless child
41
Q

According to Buss, why are ppl so unhappy?

A
  • 1.) discrepancies between modern and ancestral environment (used to live in large groups now in nuclear families making us feel isloated/lack social support)
  • 2.) modern environments appear to negatively impact how we feel (more self-perceived failure bc of media and less satisfaction w/ partners bc of media)
  • 3.) there are adaptations that cause distress (many neg emotions helps us solve adaptive problems of social living)
42
Q

How can understanding the evolution of emotion improve happiness?

A
  • 1.) close the gap between modern & ancestral conditions (closer contact w/ kin; develop deep friendships)
  • 2.) reduce subjective distress (finding similar mate; being near extended kin reduces likelihood of incest, child abuse, dom violence, etc.)
  • 3.) managing competitive mechanisms (promote cooperation)
43
Q

Explain the Social Navigation Hypothesis for depression? (REH)

A
  • depression is triggered by complex social problems that altered fitness
  • 1.) social rumination helps find solutions to social problems
  • 2.)extortion of group members increases help given by group
  • 3.) honest signaling elicits aid from social partners
44
Q

Explain the Analytic Rumination hypothesis for depression?

A
  • depression is triggered by analytically complex fitness related problems
  • depressive symptoms help solution analysis which equates to an unrelenting investigation of the problem
  • helps solve fitness related problems
45
Q

Explain the social risk hypothesis for depression

A
  • depression is triggered by negative social solutions that may cause group exclusion or low group value
  • reduces risk taking behaviors to maintain group membership
  • increases interpersonal sensitivity and submissive behavior
46
Q

Explain Trivers theory about parental investment and sexual selection

A
  • differences between men and women in the minimum levels of parental investment drive sex differences
  • the sex that invests more (women) tend to be choosier selecting mates
  • sex that invests less tends to compete more for mates; less choosy; prefer signals of fertility
47
Q

Why do sex differences exist at all?

A
  • sex is defined by the size of the sex cells and individual possesses (women have few large eggs,men have many small mobile sperm)
48
Q

Do men or women prefer more sex partners? How bug is the difference at different time points (month vs lifetime)?

A
  • women max. about 5 partners lifetime (one or 2 a month)

- men 2-3 a month, max lifetime about 17

49
Q

How much difference in age of spouse to men and women prefer? How does this vary across cultures?

A
  • in US women prefer spouse 2 yrs older, men prefer 2 yrs younger
  • overall men prefer younger spouses, women prefer older
  • some cultures prefer a much wider age gap
50
Q

What is sexually antagonistic coevolution? What evidence supports this?

A
  • things that optimize one partner’s outcomes do not match those that optimize the other partner’s outcomes
  • similar to Red Queen Principle but specific about sexual competitions within species adaptations
  • Rice’s fruit fly study: males allowed to evolve while females weren’t, so male fitness increases and had higher reproductive success; while female fitness decreased
51
Q

What characteristics do women prefer in a long term mate?

A
  • men who are able to invest
  • high social status, older age, good financial prospects
  • dependable, loving, committed
  • compatible with similar values and personality
  • good parenting skills