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Evolutionary Biology of Parasitism
Published in Eric S. Loker, Bruce V. Hofkin, Parasitology, 2023
Eric S. Loker, Bruce V. Hofkin
Sexual selection can be thought of as two forms of intraspecific competition. The first is intrasex competition, such as between males fighting for access to females, with the most robust and vigorous male prevailing. In this case, the males are said to elaborate weapons used in combat. With respect to male-male competition, males impaired by high parasite loads may be smaller in size, produce smaller weapons such as antlers, have less stamina and strength and even have their genitalia effectively blocked by parasites, all of which would make them less able to compete for access to mates. Healthy individuals consequently would tend to win the right to reproduce.
Pretty People / Aesthetic Enhancement
Published in Jonathan Anomaly, Creating Future People, 2020
Darwin and his contemporary defenders disagree (Prum, 2017). On Darwin’s view, sexual selection can become so divorced from natural selection that it can drive a species into extinction. Beauty can be a false signal, or it can be nothing other than a trait that females happen to find attractive, even if it originated in the need to decipher genetic quality.
Mosquito Life Histories
Published in Jacques Derek Charlwood, The Ecology of Malaria Vectors, 2019
The fibrillae act as the male mosquitoes’ ‘ears’ and respond to the female flight tone but not to the sound of other males. Females are also able to hear with their antennae but not as well as males. Females beat their wings approximately 400 times a second (400 Hz) but males beat their wings at 600 Hz. Despite their lower wingbeat frequency, females fly much faster than males; so in order to mate, the male has to increase his flight speed to catch up with the female once he has heard her. This may be one way that natural, or sexual, selection can act during mating.
The Entanglement of Being: Sexuality Inside and Outside the Binary
Published in Studies in Gender and Sexuality, 2021
Such a theory of social selection is compelling, but it is simplistic to reverse and replace the Darwinian theory of individual sexual selection with another singular evolutionary account. Although many animal behaviors are organized around social cohesion and generativity, there are exceptions that cannot be ignored. When female bird pairs struggle compared to their male/female pair counterparts to keep up with food acquisition and protecting their nests, such persistence in lifelong pair-bonding and parenting makes no evolutionary sense. When female monkeys bond for life but show no interest and even continual hostility toward each other’s young, a singular theory of generativity does not explain it adequately. When male rams pair-bond with each other and refuse any opportunities to procreate, many questions remain. The sexual diversity that prevails across species, even seemingly at great cost, mirrors human experience that persists and cannot be justly represented through any singular formulation.
Using an evolutionary perspective to understand the relationship between physical aggression and academic performance in late adolescents
Published in Journal of School Violence, 2019
José Antonio Muñoz Reyes, Rómulo Guerra, Pablo Polo, Eduardo Cavieres, Miguel Pita, Enrique Turiégano
The use of aggressiveness generates great social concern, since it affects humans along several aspects of their lives, but especially during adolescence (e.g., negative effects in life satisfaction for aggressors in Valois, Zullig, Huebner, & Drane, 2001; negative effects in quality of life for victims of bullying in Frisén & Bjarnelind, 2010; negative academic performance for aggressors; Loveland, Lounsbury, Welsh, & Buboltz, 2007; etc.). But in general, a broad perspective and explanation of the phenomena is missing. In this regard, evolutionary psychology offers a solid framework to address questions concerning human aggression. Within the evolutionary framework, aggressiveness is described as an adaptive strategy to solve contest competitions among individuals. When the competition is within-same sex individuals over the access to mates, aggression is related to sexual selection processes (Archer, 2009; Campbell, 2009; Puts, 2010). Sexual selection is a type of natural selection that causes the retention of traits (physical or psychological features) that increase the reproductive success of those individuals displaying them (Darwin, 1871). Sexual selection is usually divided in two mechanisms: intersexual selection in which individuals compete to attract or charm individuals of the opposite sex and intrasexual selection in which individuals compete to exclude rivals from mating and, therefore, monopolizing mating access themselves (Darwin, 1871).
Psychedelics and music: neuroscience and therapeutic implications
Published in International Review of Psychiatry, 2018
Frederick S. Barrett, Katrin H. Preller, Mendel Kaelen
Alternative evolutionary theories focus on social functions of music or view music as a product of sexual selection (Hauser & McDermott, 2003). Although a consensus on biological origins of music is yet to be found, an increasing number of empirical studies illustrate a diverse significance of music in human development and culture. Research with infants indicates biological predispositions for melody-perception (Trehub, 2001), which likely serves an important social function (Mehr, Song, & Spelke, 2016), and cross-cultural studies show a universal singing of lullabies by mothers (Trehub & Trainor, 1998). Cross-cultural studies have also provided evidence that emotional content can be universally perceived as being associated with acoustic properties of music (Fritz et al., 2009; Laukka, Eerola, Thingujam, Yamasaki, & Beller, 2013). Emotional responses to music occur reliably in young children (Dalla Bella, Peretz, Rousseau, & Gosselin, 2001; Mote, 2011) and occur continuously in daily life (Juslin, Liljestrom, Vastfjall, Barradas, & Silva, 2008). Across the globe, music is an important element of diverse aspects of life, ranging from work, entertainment, and social settings to medicine and spirituality (Hargreaves & North, 1999; Merriam, 1964; Nettl, 1956).