Evolutionary theory

Studies

Ronay and Von Hippel (2010) Terms to define

• Evolutionary theory

• Natural selection

• Sexual selection

Ronay and Von Hippel (2010) Aim

To determine if men would take greater risks in the presence of an attractive female, than in the presence of a male. In addition, they wanted to see if testosterone played a role in this behavior

Ronay and Von Hippel (2010) Procedure

• 43 male skateboarders where assigned to the male-researcher condition

• 53 of them were assigned to the female-researcher condition

• They were asked to performe one ‘easy trick’ and one ‘difficult trick’ they could succesfully complete aprox 50% of the time

• They were asked to do each trick 10 times

• After some time they were asked to perform 10 more attempts of each trick but this time infront of the same male researcher or an attractive female researcher

• The attractiveness of the female researcher was established by 20 male raters that viewed potential researchers

• High levels of aborted attempts wuld be seen as low-risk taking

• Saliva samples were also collected at the end of the experiment to measure testosterone

• Heart rate was measured using a sports watch

• All the measurments were taken immediatly prior to the test then measured throughout the task

Ronay and Von Hippel (2010) Results

• Participants took greater risks on the difficult tricks in the presence of the female researcher (they aborted the trick fewer times)

• Testosterone levels were higher in the men that skateboarded in front of the female researcher than infornt of the male researcher

• There was no significant difference in the measure of heart rate between the two groups

• The increased risk-taking is a sign to potential mates that the male is healthy, strong and dominant (be able to intimidate any potential rival)

Ronay and Von Hippel (2010) Evaluation

Clark and Hatfied (1989) Terms to define

• Evolutionary theory

• Natural selection

• Sexual selection

Clark and Hatfied (1989) Aim

To see if there really are gender differences in the approach to casual sexual activity

Clark and Hatfied (1989) Procedure

• Two experiments with identical results

• 48 men and 48 women

• Interacted with nine confederates (5 women, 4 men)

• The confederates approached attractive strangers of the opposite sex and rated their attractiveness

• They then expressed their attraction and ranomly asked one of three questions. 1. ‘Would you go out with me tonaight?’, 2. ‘Would you come over to my apartment tonight?’, 3. Would you go to bed with me tonight?’

• The questions were asked randomly

• Interactions occured only on weekdays and not between classes and avoiding rainy weather

• All participants were debreifed

Clark and Hatfied (1989) Results

• When the males asked the females, 56 accepted the date, 6 to the apartment and 0 to go to bed

• When the females asked the males, 50 accepted the date, 69 to the apartment and 75 to go to bed

• In both cases rougly 70% of the men were willing to have casual sex

• In both experiments none of the women agreed to casual sex

• The level of attractiveness of the confederate had no significant impact on thee response from the participant

Clark and Hatfied (1989) Evaluation

Strenghts:

• The participants were debriefed after the study ended

Evolutionary theory and studies general evaluation

• Evoutionary theories are based on the assumption that behaviors are inherited

• It is difficult to know to what extent certain behaviors are genetically inherited

• Due to difficulty in testing evolutionary theories reserachers may be susceptible to confirmation bias

• Lack of ecological validity

• Often involves animals as participants and can be difficult to generalize to humans

• Evolutionary arguments often underestimate the role of cultural influences in shaping behavior