64 posts · 14,320 views
Evolutionary Experimental Psychology
Jesse Marczyk
64 posts
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- May 18, 2013
- 11:40 AM
- 55 views
Why Psychology 101 Should Be Evolutionary Psychology
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
In two recent posts, I have referenced a relatively-average psychologist (again, this psychologist need not bear any resemblance to any particular person, living or dead). I found this relatively-average psychologist to be severely handicapped in their ability to think about … Continue reading →... Read more »
Smallegange, R., van Gemert, G., van de Vegte-Bolmer, M., Gezan, S., Takken, W., Sauerwein, R., & Logan, J. (2013) Malaria Infected Mosquitoes Express Enhanced Attraction to Human Odor. PLoS ONE, 8(5). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0063602
- May 11, 2013
- 01:19 AM
- 49 views
Welcome To Introduction To Psychology
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
In my last post, I mentioned a hypothetical relatively-average psychologist (caveat: the term doesn’t necessarily apply to any specific person, living or dead). I found him to be a bit strange, since he tended to come up with hypotheses that … Continue reading →... Read more »
Cornwell, R., Palmer, C., Guinther, P., & Davis. H. (2005) Introductory Psychology Texts as a View of Sociobiology/Evolutionary Psychology’s Role in Psychology. Evolutionary Psychology, 355-374. info:/
- May 1, 2013
- 10:05 PM
- 79 views
I Find Your Lack Of Theory (And Replications) Disturbing
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
Let’s say you find yourself in charge of a group of children. Since you’re a relatively-average psychologist, you have a relatively strange hypothesis you want to test: you want to see whether wearing a red shirt will make children better … Continue reading →... Read more »
Shanks, D., Newell, B., Lee, E., Balakrishnan, D., Ekelund, L., Cenac, Z., Kavvadia, F., & Moore, C. (2013) Priming Intelligent Behavior: An Elusive Phenomenon. PLoS ONE, 8(4). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0056515
- April 27, 2013
- 11:09 AM
- 92 views
He’s Climbing In Your Windows; He’s Snatching Your People Up
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
One topic that has been addressed by evolutionary psychologists that managed to draw a good deal of ire was rape. Given the sensitive nature of the issue, the criticisms that the theorizing about it brought were largely undeserved, reflecting, perhaps, … Continue reading →... Read more »
Felson, R., & Cundiff, P. (2012) Age and sexual assault during robberies. Evolution and Human Behavior, 33(1), 10-16. DOI: 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2011.04.002
- April 22, 2013
- 07:30 PM
- 93 views
Why Hang Them Seperately When We Can Hang Them Together?
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
For those of you lucky enough to not have encountered it, there is a concept known as privilege that floats around in predominately feminist-leaning groups. The basic idea of the concept of privilege is that some groups of people have … Continue reading →... Read more »
DeScioli, P., & Kurzban, R. (2013) A solution to the mysteries of morality. Psychological Bulletin, 139(2), 477-496. DOI: 10.1037/a0029065
Uhlmann, E., Zhu, L., Pizarro, D., & Bloom, P. (2012) Blood is thicker: Moral spillover effects based on kinship. Cognition, 124(2), 239-243. DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2012.04.010
- April 16, 2013
- 09:12 PM
- 58 views
An Implausible Function For Depression
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
Recently, I was involved in a discussion about experimenter-induced expectation biases in performance, also known as demand characteristics. The basic premise of the idea runs along the following lines: some subjects in your experiment are interested in pleasing the experimenter … Continue reading →... Read more »
Moore, M., & Fresco, D. (2012) Depressive realism: A meta-analytic review. Clinical Psychology Review, 32(6), 496-509. DOI: 10.1016/j.cpr.2012.05.004
- April 11, 2013
- 01:28 AM
- 52 views
Mothers And Others (With Benefits)
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
Understanding the existence and persistence of homosexuality in the face of its apparently reproductive fitness costs has left many evolutionary researchers scratching their heads. Though research into homosexuality has not been left wanting for hypotheses, every known hypothesis to date … Continue reading →... Read more »
Kuhle BX, & Radtke S. (2013) Born both ways: The alloparenting hypothesis for sexual fluidity in women. Evolutionary psychology : an international journal of evolutionary approaches to psychology and behavior, 11(2), 304-23. PMID: 23563096
- April 8, 2013
- 01:00 AM
- 95 views
Should Psychological Neuroscience Research Be Funded?
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
In my last post, when discussing some research by Singer et al (2006), I mentioned as an aside that their use of fMRI data didn’t seem to add a whole lot to their experiment. Yes, they found that brain regions … Continue reading →... Read more »
Singer, T., Seymour, B., O'Doherty, J., Stephan, K., Dolan, R., & Frith, C. (2006) Empathic neural responses are modulated by the perceived fairness of others. Nature, 439(7075), 466-469. DOI: 10.1038/nature04271
- April 4, 2013
- 07:42 PM
- 113 views
Reactions To Reactions About Steubenville
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
Around the middle of last month, CNN came under some social-media fire. The source of this fire came from the perception among some people that CNN had covered the Steubenville rape case inappropriately. More precisely, the outrage focused on the … Continue reading →... Read more »
Descioli P, & Kurzban R. (2013) A solution to the mysteries of morality. Psychological bulletin, 139(2), 477-96. PMID: 22747563
Singer, T., Seymour, B., O'Doherty, J., Stephan, K., Dolan, R., & Frith, C. (2006) Empathic neural responses are modulated by the perceived fairness of others. Nature, 439(7075), 466-469. DOI: 10.1038/nature04271
- March 26, 2013
- 10:41 AM
- 167 views
Belief In “Belief In A Just World” Theory
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
I have a new theory that goes something like this: social psychologists have a need to believe in their own hypotheses – a belief in the truth of their hypotheses (or BTH for short). When evidence turns up that is … Continue reading →... Read more »
Callan, M., Powell, N., & Ellard, J. (2007) The Consequences of Victim Physical Attractiveness on Reactions to Injustice: The Role of Observers’ Belief in a Just World. Social Justice Research, 20(4), 433-456. DOI: 10.1007/s11211-007-0053-9
- March 16, 2013
- 05:37 PM
- 186 views
A New Theory For Homosexuality: A Lot Like The Old Ones
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
Homosexuality – male homosexuality in particular – poses a real evolutionary mystery that researchers have been trying to solve for at least the past two decades without much success. Though many explanations have been put forth to try and find … Continue reading →... Read more »
Barthes, J., Godelle, B., & Raymond, M. (2013) Human social stratification and hypergyny: toward an understanding of male homosexual preference. Evolution and Human Behavior. DOI: 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2013.01.001
- March 9, 2013
- 05:18 PM
- 169 views
Tropes Against Video Games
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
Back in mid-May of last year, Anita Sarkeesian launched a Kickstarter project to help fund her video series on portrayals of women in video games called “Tropes vs. Women in Video Games”. Her initial goal was set at $6000 for … Continue reading →... Read more »
Zahavi, A. (1975) Mate selection—A selection for a handicap. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 53(1), 205-214. DOI: 10.1016/0022-5193(75)90111-3
- March 4, 2013
- 07:14 PM
- 174 views
Do People “Really” Have Priors?
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
As of late, I’ve been dipping my toes ever-deeper into the conceptual world of statistics. If one aspires towards understanding precisely what they’re seeing in when it comes to research in psychology, understanding statistics can go a long way. Unfortunately, … Continue reading →... Read more »
Dienes, Z. (2011) Bayesian Versus Orthodox Statistics: Which Side Are You On?. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 6(3), 274-290. DOI: 10.1177/1745691611406920
- February 23, 2013
- 05:16 PM
- 197 views
Statisticial Issues In Psychology And What Not To Do About Them
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
As I’ve discussed previously, there are a number of theoretical and practical issues that plague psychological research in terms of statistical testing. On the theoretical end of things, if you collect enough subjects, you’re all but guaranteed to find some … Continue reading →... Read more »
Perneger TV. (1998) What's wrong with Bonferroni adjustments?. BMJ (Clinical research ed.), 316(7139), 1236-8. PMID: 9553006
- February 21, 2013
- 07:49 PM
- 213 views
“Nice Guys”, The Friend Zone, And Social Semantics
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
A little over a year ago, a video entitled, “Why men and women can’t be friends” was uploaded to YouTube. In the video, a man approaches various men and women and presents them with the question, “can men and women … Continue reading →... Read more »
Trivers, R. (1971) The Evolution of Reciprocal Altruism. The Quarterly Review of Biology, 46(1), 35. DOI: 10.1086/406755
- February 19, 2013
- 10:54 AM
- 185 views
What Should We Mean When We Say “Universal”?
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
My last post prompted a series of spirited discussions, each of which I found interesting for slightly different reasons. Over the course of one of those discussion, a commenter over at Psychology Today (H/T to Anthro_girl) referred me to an … Continue reading →... Read more »
Bolhuis JJ, Brown GR, Richardson RC, & Laland KN. (2011) Darwin in mind: new opportunities for evolutionary psychology. PLoS biology, 9(7). PMID: 21811401
Norenzayan, A., & Heine, S. (2005) Psychological Universals: What Are They and How Can We Know?. Psychological Bulletin, 131(5), 763-784. DOI: 10.1037/0033-2909.131.5.763
- February 12, 2013
- 06:15 PM
- 121 views
Is It Only “Good” Science When It Confirms Your World View?
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
Most people, when critical of some finding or some field, try to do things like keep their biases hidden, opting instead to try and argue from a position of perceived intellectual neutrality. Kate Clancy, evidently, is not most people. In … Continue reading →... Read more »
Tybur, J., Miller, G., & Gangestad, S. (2007) Testing the controversy: An empirical examination of adaptationists' attitudes towards politics and science. Human Nature, 18(4), 313-328. DOI: 10.1007/s12110-007-9024-y
- February 7, 2013
- 10:58 AM
- 207 views
Should You Give A Damn About Your Reputation (Part 2)
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
In my last post, I outlined a number of theoretical problems that stand in the way of reputation being a substantial force for maintaining cooperation via indirect reciprocity. Just to recap them quickly: (1) reputational information is unlikely to be … Continue reading →... Read more »
Tooby, J., & Cosmides, L. (1996) Friendship and the banker’s paradox:Other pathways to the evolution of adaptations for altruism. Proceedings of the British Academy, 119-143. info:/
- February 3, 2013
- 11:47 AM
- 155 views
Should You Give A Damn About Your Reputation? (Part 1)
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
According to Nowak (2012) and his endlessly-helpful mathematical models, once one assumes that cooperation can be sustained via one’s reputation, one ends up with the conclusion that cooperation can, indeed, be sustained (solely) by reputation, even if the same two … Continue reading →... Read more »
Sigmund, K. (2012) Moral assessment in indirect reciprocity. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 25-30. DOI: 10.1016/j.jtbi.2011.03.024
- January 31, 2013
- 12:27 AM
- 152 views
5 Weak Ideas About The Origin Of Homosexuality: A Reply
by Jesse Marczyk in Pop Psychology
Back at the end of last month, Mark Van Vugt presented what he considered to be five candidate selection pressures which might explain how homosexuality as an orientation – the exlcusive preference for same-sex sexual partners – came to both … Continue reading →... Read more »
Cochran, G., Ewald, P., & Cochran, K. (2000) Infectious Causation of Disease: An Evolutionary Perspective. Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 43(3), 406-448. DOI: 10.1353/pbm.2000.0016
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