Principles of evolutionary psychology

Leda Cosmides and John Tooby, two of the most influential evolutionary psychologists, outlined six core
tenants of evolutionary psychology in a 2005 paper.

Tenet 1

Your brain’s purpose is to analyze information from the environment like a computer would process
information. The brain is a physical system, and its pathways to process information are fine-tuned
through natural selection.

“Pathways” refers to the connections between brain cells, or neurons, that allow messages to travel
from one region of the nervous system to another.

In other words, a pathway is a group of neurons working together to get something done, like moving
your feet to walk or turning the page when you’re reading.

Neural pathways are essential to learning but also to repeating behaviors you’ve already learned.

When you do something you’ve never done before, you have no pathway for that specific behavior. As
you engage in the behavior, neurons start to get together and pass the message. The pathway becomes
stronger the more you repeat the behavior, and it becomes easier or more likely for you to do the
behavior.

Tenet 2

Your behaviors are a response to the information your brain has gathered from both its internal and
external environment.

This suggests that understanding your behavior means understanding how you process information, as
well as understanding your thought pathways or patterns.

Tenet 3
The pathways your brain has created from gathering and processing information have been influenced
over time by ancestral environments. These evolutionary thought processes have roots in two main
goals: survival and reproduction.

Tenet 4

Some evolutionary behaviors may hold no benefit in current environments. But, since cognitive
programming may come from your ancestors, it may still contribute to handling modern-day challenges.

Tenet 5

The brain has many evolutionary pathways, each one intended to solve a particular problem your
ancestors faced.

The more diverse your pathways, the more challenges you’re able to overcome.

In other words, you may have pathways in your brain that have not been created by your behaviors but
come from the behaviors and experiences of your ancestors.

Tenet 6

Each of your preprogrammed pathways allows your brain to categorize your individual experiences.

You’re able to compare, analyze, recognize patterns, and develop concepts based on the framework
you’ve inherited.

Evolutionary Psychology
Evolutionary psychology is a branch of psychology that applies evolutionary theory to the study
of human behavior. It examines how different behaviors have evolved over time and why certain
behaviors are more common than others. It is used to explain why some people are more
successful than others, why certain relationships form, and why certain emotions are more
common than others.

Evolutionary psychology is also used to explain why some people are more prone to certain
mental illnesses than others, why some people are more susceptible to addiction than others, and
why some people are more likely to engage in risky behaviors than others.
https://psychcentral.com/health/evolutionary-psychology#examples