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Knowledge of evolutionary influences on patterns of human mating, social interactions, and differential health is increasing, yet these insights have rarely been applied to historical analyses of human population dynamics. The genetic and evolutionary forces behind biases in interethnic mating and in the health of individuals of different ethnic groups in Latin America and the Caribbean since the European colonization of America are still largely ignored. We discuss how historical and contemporary sociocultural interactions and practices are strongly influenced by population-level evolutionary forces. Specifically, we discuss the historical implications of functional (de facto) polygyny, sex-biased admixture, and assortative mating in Latin America. We propose that these three evolutionary mechanisms influenced mating patterns, shaping the genetic and cultural landscape across Latin America and the Caribbean. Further, we discuss how genetic differences between the original populations that migrated at different times into Latin America contributed to their accommodation to and survival in the different local ecologies and interethnic interactions. Relevant medical and social implications follow from the genetic and cultural changes reviewed. UCR::Vicerrectoría de Investigación::Unidades de Investigación::Ciencias Sociales::Instituto de Investigaciones Psicológicas (IIP)

We tracked the relative integration and differentiation among life history traits over the period spanning AD 1800–1999 in the Britannic and Gallic biocultural groups. We found that Britannic populations tended toward greater strategic differentiation, while Gallic populations tended toward greater strategic integration. The dynamics of between-group competition between these two erstwhile rival biocultural groups were hypothesized as driving these processes. We constructed a latent factor that specifically sought to measure between-group competition and residualized it for the logarithmic effects of time. We found a significantly asymmetrical impact of between-group competition, where the between-group competition factor appeared to be driving the diachronic integration in Gallic populations but had no significantly corresponding influence on the parallel process of diachronic differentiation in Britannic populations. This suggests that the latter process was attributable to some alternative and unmeasured causes, such as the resource abundance consequent to territorial expansion rather than contraction.

Baumard proposes that life history slowing in populations over time is the principal driver of innovation rates. We show that this is only true of micro-innovation rates, which reflect cognitive and economic specialization as an adaptation to high population density, and not macro-innovation rates, which relate more to a population's level of general intelligence.

Our commentary articulates some of the commonalities between Baumeister et al.'s theory of socially differentiated roles and Strategic Differentiation-Integration Effort. We expand upon the target article's position by arguing that differentiating social roles is contextual and driven by varying ecological pressures, producing character displacement not only among individuals within complex societies, but also across social systems and multiple levels of organization.

Fincher & Thornhill (F&T) present a compelling argument that parasite stress underlies certain cultural practices promoting assortative sociality. However, we suggest that the theoretical framework proposed is limited in several ways, and that life history theory provides a more explanatory and inclusive framework, making more specific predictions about the trade-offs faced by organisms in the allocation of bioenergetic and material resources.

Del Giudice addresses a complex and pertinent theoretical issue: the evolutionary adaptiveness of sex differences in attachment styles in relation to life history strategy. Although we applaud Del Giudice for calling attention to the problem, we regret that he does not sufficiently specify how attachment styles serve as an integral part of a coordinate life history strategy for either sex.

The “straw man” prior expectation of the dominant social psychology paradigm is that humans should behave with perfect rationality and high ethical standards. The more modest claim of evolutionary psychologists is that humans have evolved specific adaptations for adaptive problems that were reliably present in the ancestral environment. Outside that restricted range of problems, one should not expect optimal behavior.

Mealey distinguishes two types of sociopathy: (1) “primary,” or obligate, and (2) “secondary,” or facultative. Either sociopathy evolved twice, or one form is derived from the other, e.g., through: (1) genetic assimilation generating polymorphism in the relative strength of biases favoring the development of otherwise facultative strategies, or (2) independently heritable but strategically relevant characteristics biasing the optimal selection of facultative strategies.

Many now consider “instinct” and “learning” opposite poles of a unidimensional continuum. An alternative model with two independently varying parameters predicts different selective pressures. Behavioral adaptation matches the organism's utilizations of stimuli and responses to their ecological validities: the mean validity over evolutionary time specifies the optimal initial potency of the prepared association; the variance specifies the optimal prepared plasticity.