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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20110404T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20110404T000000
DTSTAMP:20201013T004820Z
CREATED:20200922T214837Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004820Z
UID:4167-1301875200-1301875200@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Christopher von Rueden - Why do men seek positions of status or leadership?
DESCRIPTION:Christopher von Rueden: UCSB Department of AnthropologyThe relationship between social status and reproductive success in small-scale societies can provide insight into how natural selection may have acted on status-seeking behavior in ancestral human environments. With data from the Tsimane horticulturalists of Bolivia and other small-scale societies\, I show that high male status increases lifetime fitness\, and I analyze the factors responsible for increases in surviving offspring among high status men. Interview data from the Tsimane suggest that mate acquisition and social support mediate the status-fitness relationship. Some of the fitness benefits of high status may accrue in the context of leadership within collective actions. However\, observation and experimental induction of collective action suggest that Tsimane leaders do not differentially benefit from the division of spoils (although leadership may improve team efficiency). Identifying the proximate pathways by which status and leadership generate current fitness sheds light on the kinds of social relationships evolution has motivated men to maintain.http://bec.ucla.edu/papers/VonRueden1.pdf
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/christopher-von-rueden-why-do-men-seek-positions-of-status-or-leadership/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20110411T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20110411T000000
DTSTAMP:20201013T004820Z
CREATED:20200922T214838Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004820Z
UID:4168-1302480000-1302480000@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Andrew Delton - Welfare Tradeoffs: Computation\, Reciprocity\, and Social Emotions
DESCRIPTION:Andrew Delton: UCSB Department of Psychology and Center for Evolutionary PsychologyMembers of social species routinely make decisions that involve welfare allocations—decisions that impact the welfare of two or more parties. These decisions often involve welfare tradeoffs such that increasing one organism’s welfare comes at the expense of another organism’s welfare. In this talk\, I present preliminary evidence that the mind computes a variable—a welfare tradeoff ratio—that is used to regulate this kind of social decision-making. By consulting this variable\, an organism can determine when it is and is not appropriate to cede personal welfare on behalf of another. I also summarize an initial empirical test of the role of welfare tradeoff ratios in reciprocity and how the emotions of anger and gratitude might function to recalibrate welfare tradeoff ratios within reciprocal relationships. The larger theme of this talk is that thinking in terms of neurocomputational variables such as welfare tradeoff ratios helps to explain how complex behaviors—such as cooperation\, generosity\, and aggression—can arise from a physical device such as the human brain.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/andrew-delton-welfare-tradeoffs-computation-reciprocity-and-social-emotions/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20110418T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20110418T000000
DTSTAMP:20201013T004820Z
CREATED:20200922T214901Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004820Z
UID:4169-1303084800-1303084800@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Polly Wiessner - Cycles of War among the Enga of Papua New Guinea: Youths\, Elders and Indoctrinability.
DESCRIPTION:Polly Wiessner: University of Utah Department of AnthropologyIndoctrinability\, the capacity to be inculcated with values or doctrines and to accept them uncritically\, poses an evolutionary puzzle because it can lead individuals to voluntarily sacrificing immediate individual interest for a belief\, cause\, or group. I will briefly explore the cognitive capacities underlying indoctrinability. Then I will propose that strong social selection for indoctrinability was an outcome of parent-offspring conflict in arranging marriage and in building cooperative cohorts. That is\, elders used their control over the marriage market\, as well as their network and information advantages\, to persuade youths to uncritically accept cultural beliefs that would to align the goals of youth with their own. I will illustrate these ideas in a case study among the Enga of PNG by: (1) outlining the different agendas of elders and youth in different periods over 250 years of Enga history and (2) showing how elders manipulated  indoctrination through ritual and other means to instill norms\, values and beliefs that guided peace and war in pre-contact generations and even today when youths have the advantage of wielding high-powered weapons.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/polly-wiessner-cycles-of-war-among-the-enga-of-papua-new-guinea-youths-elders-and-indoctrinability/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20110425T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20110425T000000
DTSTAMP:20201013T004820Z
CREATED:20200922T214902Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201013T004820Z
UID:4170-1303689600-1303689600@bec.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Daniel M.T. Fessler - The Importance of Attending to Phylogenetic Derivation in the Study of the Mind Or Why Emotions are Kludgy Or Some Gross Conclusions from the Study of Grossness
DESCRIPTION:Daniel M.T. Fessler: UCLA Department of AnthropologyThe evolutionary study of mind and behavior has benefited enormously from the functionality heuristic\, i.e.\, the assumption that mental mechanisms can usefully be understood as well-designed solutions to recurrent adaptive problems.  While virtually every investigator in this area acknowledges the importance of Tinbergen’s (1963) Four Levels of Explanation\, in practice\, emphasis in evolutionary psychology is invariably placed primarily on ultimate explanations.  Although this is a productive starting point\, because evolution involves the gradual modification of existing designs\, the functionality heuristic will frequently lead investigators to under-emphasize\, or even overlook entirely\, constraints on optimality entailed by phylogeny.  Likewise\, even when high levels of functionality are\, in fact\, observed\, the functionality heuristic will often fail to explain many features of the adaptation at issue\, features that diminish efficiency even if they do not influence effectiveness.  The study of emotions provides an opportunity to illustrate the utility of combining ultimate and phylogenetic perspectives in investigating the mind.  A hybrid approach to emotions can illuminate otherwise puzzling combinations of qualia\, display\, cognition\, and behavior\, and suggests areas where we might expect constraints on optimality.  Additionally\, such an approach can productively generate predictions concerning the nature of emotions across species and across taxa\, holding the promise of a broadly comparative evolutionary affective science that pinpoints both the commonalities and the divergences between our emotions and those of other organisms.  These possibilities will be illustrated through a discussion of research on the evolutionary psychology of disgust.
URL:https://bec.ucla.edu/event/daniel-m-t-fessler-the-importance-of-attending-to-phylogenetic-derivation-in-the-study-of-the-mind-or-why-emotions-are-kludgy-or-some-gross-conclusions-from-the-study-of-grossness/
CATEGORIES:Past Presentation,Presentation
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