Geneva Vásquez

The heritability of life history strategy : The K-factor, covitality, and personality

Abstract Archival data from the MIDUS survey (Brim et al., 2000), a nationally representative sample, on 309 MZ and 333 DZ twin pairs aged 25–74 years were used to test the psychometrics and behavioral genetics of life history strategy. We organized 253 of the originally administered 2,000 questions into 30 scales measuring life history traits (e.g., quality of family relationships and altruism towards kin), medical symptoms (e.g., thyroid problems), personality traits (e.g., neuroticism, extraversion, conscientiousness), and social background (e.g., financial security). A single higher‐order factor, indicating a general life history strategy, composed of three lower‐order factors, was replicated. Factor analyses were then performed on the genetic variance‐covariance matrices. We found that (a) a single higher‐order factor explained the preponderance of the genetic correlations among the scales and (b) this higher‐order factor was itself 68 percent heritable and accounted for 82 percent of the genetic variance among the three component lower‐order factors.

The K-factor, Covitality, and personality

We present a psychometric test of life history theory as applied to human individual differences using MIDUS survey data (Brim et al. 2000). Twenty scales measuring cognitive and behavioral dimensions theoretically related to life history strategy were constructed using items from the MIDUS survey. These scales were used to construct a single common factor, the K-factor, which accounted for 70% of the reliable variance. The scales used included measures of personal, familial, and social function. A second common factor, Covitality, was constructed from scales for physical and mental health. Finally, a single general factor, Personality, was constructed from scales for the “Big Five” factors of personality. The K-factor, covitality factor, and general personality factor correlated significantly with each other, supporting the prediction that high K predicts high somatic effort and also manifests in behavioral display. Thus, a single higher-order common factor, the Super-K factor, was constructed that consisted of the K-factor, covitality factor, and personality factor.

Evolutionary Personality Psychology

Multiple selective pressures maintain and increase heritable behavioral variability among individuals across both developmental and evolutionary time: (1) directional social selection favors convergent traits, promoting mutually beneficial cooperative interactions; (2) disruptive social selection favors divergent traits, providing release from within-species competition; (3) genetic diversification responds adaptively to the stochastic (random) characteristics of environmental hazards such as uncontrollable morbidity (disease) and mortality (death); (4) developmental plasticity epigenetically directs development adaptively along different alternative pathways, modifying permanent and stable behavioral dispositions to suit long-term contingencies of survival and reproduction; and (5) behavioral flexibility deploys rapid and reversible short-term adaptive behavioral responses to transient situations.

The Evolutionary Psychology of Human Mate Choice: How Ecology, Genes, Fertility, and Fashion Influence Mating Strategies

Abstract The recent incorporation of sexual selection theories into the rubric of evolutionary psychology has produced an important framework from which to examine human mating behavior. Here we review the extant empirical and theoretical work regarding heterosexual human mating preferences and reproductive strategies. Initially, we review contemporary evolutionary psychologys adaptationism, including the incorporation of modern theories of sexual selection, adaptive genetic variation, and mate choice. Next, we examine womens and mens mating preferences, focusing on the adaptive significance of material, genetic and fertility benefits, and their relationship to environmental characteristics. Following this, we consider human mate choice in relation to non-adaptive preferences. This discussion ends with a look at context effects for individual differences in mate-preferences and reproductive strategies.

The Cambridge Handbook of Personality Psychology: Evolutionary theories of personality

Integration with evolutionary theory could enhance personality theory by generating original predictions about the mechanisms governing personality. Novel hypotheses about how personality works can be derived from theories about the ultimate function of personality traits. Personality psychology currently describes and explains how personality is structured and how the mechanisms that produce such differences in behavioural patterns work. Personality theorists observe how personality differences develop and explain the proximate (‘how it works’) causes of these individual differences, but generally do not address ultimate (‘why it works’) causes. Ultimate explanations address why human personalities are structured in the precise manner that they are, why specific environmental inputs affect individuals in the way that they do, why the specific epigenetic rules that dictate how an individual responds to different environmental input exist and why other rules do not, as well as why personality traits are responsive to the environment at all and what adaptive function personality characteristics may serve. By adopting a framework for answering these questions about evolved function, personality theory would become enriched with novel hypotheses. Evolutionary psychology views all psychological phenomena through the lens of the theory of evolution, in the hope that by asking why specific psychological mechanisms originally evolved, previously unidentified psychological mechanisms and new aspects of known psychological mechanisms will be illuminated. Evolution by natural and sexual selection is the only coherent framework that can explain why complex, adaptive psychological mechanisms exist andwhat adaptive problems they are designed to solve (Tooby and Cosmides, 1992). The standard social science model (SSSM) offers no explicit meta-theory to direct the investigation of personality. This leaves personality researchers to follow intuition or trial and error to direct their discovery of new psychological phenomena (Tooby and Cosmides 1992). This may impede significant progress in understanding the mechanisms underlying personality differences and the development of those characteristics. Although evolutionary psychologists agree that evolution is relevant to all psychological mechanisms, there has been very little research done on personality from an evolutionary perspective. Evolutionary psychologists have generally been interested solely in what Tooby and Cosmides (1992) have termed the psychic unity of mankind. Therefore, they have been primarily concerned with human nature rather than individual differences. Consequently, much of evolutionary personality

The Cambridge Handbook of Personality Psychology: Biological Perspectives

The Cambridge Handbook of Personality Psychology - Libros de Medicina - Personalidad/Evaluacion y Tratamiento Psicologico - 106,87