Evolutionary psychology

[John Tooby]? and [Leda Cosmides]? coined the term evolutionary psychology in their 1992 book The Adapted Mind: Evolutionary Psychology and The Generation of Culture as a way to examine the functions of the mind in terms of evolutionary adaptation. They believe that many aspects of human behavior and other cognitive processes can be better understood by determining how different behaviors might have evolved over human history. Some scientists see this as no different from [E. O. Wilson]?'s sociobiology (as described in the 1975 Sociobiology: The New Synthesis), though its proponents insist that it is a distinct discipline. Still others think that the discipline in general, and Cosmides and Tooby in particular, are too quick to generalize and draw conclusions from the very limited data they present. The book is notorious for, among other things, using their methods to explain differences in behavior between the sexes.

See [Center for Evolutionary Psychology].

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