Download 1 - UCSD Psychology

On the final, there will be 6 questions from the list below, from which you can pick 5 to answer.
Below is my tentative list of questions. Coming up with decent answers requires considerable thought and
reflection on the material you’ve been exposed to. That is, of course, the point.
Study tips:
1. You can answer these without doing extra reading, but if you know or can discover anything relevant
outside of the assigned reading, don’t hesitate to use it.
2. Devote a lot of your prep time to constructing and refining OUTLINES of what you might write in
answer to each question. With luck, you will be able to remember most essentials of the outline during the
exam. I would be interested in seeing your outlines if you email them to me, but I’m afraid I can’t generally
offer to comment on them.
3. Good answers often consist of a sequence of general claims or proposals that make up a coherent response
to the question, each of which is backed up by specific evidence or examples after you state it.
4. Study groups are efficient (and might be fun) so I recommend them. That said, I will be particularly
impressed with answers that don’t completely overlap with most other people’s.
Enjoy your explorations,
Don
1. What is Wright’s the Madonna/Whore dichotomy? Is it objectively valid, valid only as a stereotyped
reaction by males, or just invalid?
2. “Moralistic reciprocity” (Trivers) allows a culture to encourage altruistic behavior by making
altruism a requirement for social status and for receipt of altruistic favors from others. Discuss how
human culture can in this way provide a setting where objections to the idea of group selection for
altruism at the genetic level do not apply.
3. Explain at least two of the competing views about the selective pressures that gave rise to the major
increase in human brain size over the past 2 million years. Review arguments for and against each.
4. Describe and evaluate some of the contending accounts of the selective pressures that led to the
evolution of language.
5. Discuss the genetic changes that may have been important for the evolution of language in ancestral
humans.
6. Discuss the origins (in a Darwinian framework) and importance of self-deception in human life.
7. Michael Ruse and E.O Wilson have written “Ethics is an illusion fobbed off on us by our genes in
order to get us to co-operate”, suggesting that moral codes evolve not to promote the happiness and
well-being of individuals in a culture, but to promote their reproductive fitness. Which aspects of our
moral code (or the codes of other cultures) support this, and which aspects are difficult to reconcile
with it?
8. If you find some scientific reason to believe that certain inclinations or propensities characteristic of
humankind have probably been instilled in us by natural selection, does this encourage you to yield to
those, or to resist them, or neither? Why? Give examples.
9. Are there situations where it seems appropriate to yield to the naturalistic fallacy? (For instance, is it
acceptable to promote tolerance of homosexuality by showing evidence that it is genetically
influenced?) On what basis can such questions be decided?
10. Compare current American practices on marriage with more stable traditional monogamous and
polygynous societies, (Wright,90). Why does Wright say we have the worst of both worlds (104)?
11. What is best for an individual isn't necessarily what is best for his/her genes. Discuss cases where
common behavior can be considered as advantageous for reproduction, but not favorable to the wellbeing of the individual his/herself. In what sorts of situations does this tend to happen?
12. Trivers (and Wright, p226) notes that natural selection should have favored plasticity of
characteristics relevant to altruism and cheating. Why should this not apply equally to other
characteristics? What evolutionary considerations determine how developmentally labile a
characteristic should be?
13. Discuss the arguments and evidence that guilt can be adaptive in the sense of promoting reproductive
fitness. Is it a nuisance adaptation, good for our genes but undesirable for individual well-being? Is it
a misplaced adaptation, less adaptive under current conditions than it was to our hunter-gatherer
ancestors?
14. Consider the benefits and costs of unrealistic optimism at the individual and at the group level.
15. Why does modern man show less sexual dimorphism than was typical of Australopithecines? What
factors may have regulated the amount of sexual dimorphism in human biology and behavior?
16. Why did concealed ovulation evolve? How might it have aided reproductive fitness?
17. Do data on family homicide support the view that parents are more attached to their biological
children than to their stepchildren? Does a Darwinian framework necessarily predict such a
difference in attachment?
18. How could homosexuality survive natural selection?
19. Discuss the roles of similarity/dissimilarity and of masculinity/femininity in sexual selection.
20. William James (Principles of Psychology, 1890) reflected, “we, the lineal representatives of the
successful enactors of one scene of slaughter after another must, whatever more pacific virtues we
may also possess, still carry about with us, ready at any moment to burst into flame, the smoldering
and sinister traits of character by means of which they lived through so many massacres.” Is this
Darwinian perspective on war valid, and does it have implications for social action in the modern
world?
21. Under what conditions can a Tit for Tat strategy be relied on to make cooperation prevalent?
22. How could schizophrenia survive natural selection?
23. What are some of the heuristics that we use in place of fully rational decision-making, and why might
adoption of these shortcuts have been favored by natural selection?
24. What differences between males and females in their priorities and decision-making have plausibly
strongly influenced by natural selection, as opposed to being entirely culturally determined?
25. To what extent do our ideals of beauty and attractiveness make sense in an evolutionary perspective?
26. Examine Darwinian accounts of the evolution of religion. In what ways could the construction of
religious belief systems have exploited cognitive characteristics and inclinations that evolved for
other purposes?
27. Is the prevalence of patriarchy in human cultures strongly influenced by genetic gender differences?
Give supporting arguments for whichever position you decide to take.
28. List some cultural practices widespread in modern Western culture that you consider to be
reproductively maladaptive, and discuss how these may have been created and maintained.
29. There is consensus that humans have a genetically evolved capacity for culture. Is there evidence of
evolved predispositions that favor the development of particular types of culture? Discuss with
reference to either patriarchy or social stratification.