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Preferred term

evolutionary developmental psychology  

Definition

  • Evolutionary psychology is the study of how and why humans and nonhumans behave the way they do, with special attention to the particular ancestral environments that contributed to the production of the physical and behavioral aspects of an organism. Evolutionary psychology is built on on the fact of evolution by natural selection (Darwin, 1859) and asserts that the behaviors that we see today are a result of the mind or brain being shaped by millions of years of evolution (for reviews, see Buss, 1999; Tooby & Cosmides, 1992). [Source: Encyclopedia of Applied Developmental Science; Evolutionary Developmental Psychology]

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https://concepts.sagepub.com/social-science/concept/evolutionary_developmental_psychology

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