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Moral concepts, judgments, sentiments, and emotions pervade human social life. We consider certain actions obligatory, permitted, or forbidden, recognize when someone is entitled to a resource, and evaluate character using morally tinged... more
Moral concepts, judgments, sentiments, and emotions pervade human social life. We consider certain actions obligatory, permitted, or forbidden, recognize when someone is entitled to a resource, and evaluate character using morally tinged concepts such as cheater, free rider, cooperative, and trustworthy. Attitudes, actions, laws, and institutions can strike us as fair, unjust, praiseworthy, or punishable: moral judgments. Morally relevant sentiments color our experiences—empathy for another’s pain, sympathy for their loss, disgust at their transgressions— and our decisions are influenced by feelings of loyalty, altruism, warmth, and compassion. Fullblown moral emotions organize our reactions—anger toward displays of disrespect, guilt over harming those we care about, gratitude for those who sacrifice on our behalf, outrage at those who harm others with impunity. A newly reinvigorated field, moral psychology, is investigating the genesis and content of these concepts, judgments, sent...
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: Natural selection produces cognitive systems that are well designed for solving ancestral adaptive problems. For a group-living species like our own, this principle implies that interacting with others will be regulated by sophisticated... more
: Natural selection produces cognitive systems that are well designed for solving ancestral adaptive problems. For a group-living species like our own, this principle implies that interacting with others will be regulated by sophisticated cognitive systems. Here we explain how evolutionary game theory is used to identify ancestral problems of social interaction and what counted as adaptive solutions to these problems during our evolutionary past. We start with a detailed examination of selection pressures that shape mechanisms for interacting with kin; these specify an envelope of conditions in which selection favors (i) acting with beneficence toward kin and (ii) avoiding sexual contact with kin. By combining these analyses with knowledge of how our hunter-gatherer ancestors lived, evolutionary psychologists were able to develop and test hypotheses about the computational design of systems regulating interaction with kin. These cognitive adaptations produce intuitions about how we ought to treat kin and how kin ought to treat us—moral intuitions about duties of beneficence and sexual prohibitions. We then consider selection for cooperation with unrelated individuals and how this differs from interactions with kin. Topics include the evolution of cooperation by partner control (punishment) versus partner choice; collective action; and the role of luck versus effort in sharing. Research guided by these theories suggests that selection has produced adaptations that generate different moral inferences in each of these domains. Capturing this moral diversity may require normative theories that embrace moral pluralism—brands of ethical intuitionism, moral sentimentalism, or virtue ethics.
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Human foragers are obligately group-living, and their high dependence on mutual aid is believed to have characterized our species' social evolution. It was therefore a central adaptive problem for our ancestors to avoid damaging the... more
Human foragers are obligately group-living, and their high dependence on mutual aid is believed to have characterized our species' social evolution. It was therefore a central adaptive problem for our ancestors to avoid damaging the willingness of other group members to render them assistance. Cognitively, this requires a predictive map of the degree to which others would devalue the individual based on each of various possible acts. With such a map, an individual can avoid socially costly behaviors by anticipating how much audience devaluation a potential action (e.g., stealing) would cause and weigh this against the action's direct payoff (e.g., acquiring). The shame system manifests all of the functional properties required to solve this adaptive problem, with the aversive intensity of shame encoding the social cost. Previous data from three Western(ized) societies indicated that the shame evoked when the individual anticipates committing various acts closely tracks the m...
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Becoming valuable to fellow group members so that one would attract assistance in times of need is a major adaptive problem. To solve it, the individual needs a predictive map of the degree to which others value different acts so that, in... more
Becoming valuable to fellow group members so that one would attract assistance in times of need is a major adaptive problem. To solve it, the individual needs a predictive map of the degree to which others value different acts so that, in choosing how to act, the payoff arising from others' valuation of a potential action (e.g., showing bandmates that one is a skilled forager by pursuing a hard-to-acquire prey item) can be added to the direct payoff of the action (e.g., gaining the nutrients of the prey captured). The pride system seems to incorporate all of the elements necessary to solve this adaptive problem. Importantly, data from western(-ized), educated, industrialized, rich, and democratic (WEIRD) societies indicate close quantitative correspondences between pride and the valuations of audiences. Do those results generalize beyond industrial mass societies? To find out, we conducted an experiment among 567 participants in 10 small-scale societies scattered across Central ...
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... Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Rips, Lance J. The Psychology of proof: deductive reasoning in human thinking/Lance J. Rips ... My most immedi-ate creditors are Denise Cummins, Jonathan Evans, Leon Gross, Philip Johnson-Laird,... more
... Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Rips, Lance J. The Psychology of proof: deductive reasoning in human thinking/Lance J. Rips ... My most immedi-ate creditors are Denise Cummins, Jonathan Evans, Leon Gross, Philip Johnson-Laird, Matt Kurbat, John Macnamara, Jeff ...
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Why do people support economic redistribution? Hypotheses include inequity aversion, a moral sense that inequality is intrinsically unfair, and cultural explanations such as exposure to and assimilation of culturally transmitted... more
Why do people support economic redistribution? Hypotheses include inequity aversion, a moral sense that inequality is intrinsically unfair, and cultural explanations such as exposure to and assimilation of culturally transmitted ideologies. However, humans have been interacting with worse-off and better-off individuals over evolutionary time, and our motivational systems may have been naturally selected to navigate the opportunities and challenges posed by such recurrent interactions. We hypothesize that modern redistribution is perceived as an ancestral scene involving three notional players: the needy other, the better-off other, and the actor herself. We explore how three motivational systems-compassion, self-interest, and envy-guide responses to the needy other and the better-off other, and how they pattern responses to redistribution. Data from the United States, the United Kingdom, India, and Israel support this model. Endorsement of redistribution is independently predicted b...
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According to the recalibrational theory of anger, anger is a computationally complex cognitive system that evolved to bargain for better treatment. Anger coordinates facial expressions, vocal changes, verbal arguments, the withholding of... more
According to the recalibrational theory of anger, anger is a computationally complex cognitive system that evolved to bargain for better treatment. Anger coordinates facial expressions, vocal changes, verbal arguments, the withholding of benefits, the deployment of aggression, and a suite of other cognitive and physiological variables in the service of leveraging bargaining position into better outcomes. The prototypical trigger of anger is an indication that the offender places too little weight on the angry individual's welfare when making decisions, i.e. the offender has too low a welfare tradeoff ratio (WTR) toward the angry individual. Twenty-three experiments in six cultures, including a group of foragers in the Ecuadorian Amazon, tested six predictions about the computational structure of anger derived from the recalibrational theory. Subjects judged that anger would intensify when: (i) the cost was large, (ii) the benefit the offender received from imposing the cost was ...
Research Interests: Emotion, Evolutionary Psychology, Decision Making, Anger, Cognition, and 15 moreAdolescent, Bargaining, Social behavior, Cross-Cultural Comparison, Humans, Female, Male, Young Adult, Aged, Middle Aged, Adult, Psychological Theory, Social Behavior, Psychological Models, and Psychology and Cognitive Sciences
Pride occurs in every known culture, appears early in development, is reliably triggered by achievements and formidability, and causes a characteristic display that is recognized everywhere. Here, we evaluate the theory that pride evolved... more
Pride occurs in every known culture, appears early in development, is reliably triggered by achievements and formidability, and causes a characteristic display that is recognized everywhere. Here, we evaluate the theory that pride evolved to guide decisions relevant to pursuing actions that enhance valuation and respect for a person in the minds of others. By hypothesis, pride is a neurocomputational program tailored by selection to orchestrate cognition and behavior in the service of: (i) motivating the cost-effective pursuit of courses of action that would increase others' valuations and respect of the individual, (ii) motivating the advertisement of acts or characteristics whose recognition by others would lead them to enhance their evaluations of the individual, and (iii) mobilizing the individual to take advantage of the resulting enhanced social landscape. To modulate how much to invest in actions that might lead to enhanced evaluations by others, the pride system must for...
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Cognitive psychology has an opportunity to turn itself into a theoretically rigorous discipline in which a powerful set of theories organize observations and suggest focused new hypotheses. This cannot happen, however, as long as... more
Cognitive psychology has an opportunity to turn itself into a theoretically rigorous discipline in which a powerful set of theories organize observations and suggest focused new hypotheses. This cannot happen, however, as long as intuition and folk psychology continue to set our research agenda. This is because intuition systematically blinds us to the full universe of problems our minds spontaneously solve, restricting our attention instead to a minute class of unrepresentative "high-level" problems. In contrast, evolutionarily rigorous theories of adaptive function are the logical foundation on which to build cognitive theories, because the architecture of the human mind acquired its functional organization through the evolutionary process. Theories of adaptive function specify what problems our cognitive mechanisms were designed by evolution to solve, thereby supplying critical information about what their design features are likely to be. This information can free cognitive scientists from the blinders of intuition and folk psychology, allowing them to construct experiments capable of detecting complex mechanisms they otherwise would not have thought to test for. The choice is not between no-nonsense empiricism and evolutionary theory; it is between folk theory and evolutionary theory.
Research Interests: Cognitive Psychology, Cognitive Science, Epistemology, Semantics, Cognition, and 15 moreFolk Psychology, Adaptation, Theory, Attention, Research Agenda, Problem Solving, Social behavior, Humans, Animals, Instinct, Mental processes, Cognitive Theory, Biological evolution, Social Behavior, and Psychology and Cognitive Sciences
Cognitive psychology has an opportunity to turn itself into a theoretically rigorous discipline in which a powerful set of theories organize observations and suggest focused new hypotheses. This cannot happen, however, as long as... more
Cognitive psychology has an opportunity to turn itself into a theoretically rigorous discipline in which a powerful set of theories organize observations and suggest focused new hypotheses. This cannot happen, however, as long as intuition and folk psychology continue to set our research agenda. This is because intuition systematically blinds us to the full universe of problems our minds spontaneously solve, restricting our attention instead to a minute class of unrepresentative "high-level" problems. In contrast, evolutionarily rigorous theories of adaptive function are the logical foundation on which to build cognitive theories, because the architecture of the human mind acquired its functional organization through the evolutionary process. Theories of adaptive function specify what problems our cognitive mechanisms were designed by evolution to solve, thereby supplying critical information about what their design features are likely to be. This information can free cognitive scientists from the blinders of intuition and folk psychology, allowing them to construct experiments capable of detecting complex mechanisms they otherwise would not have thought to test for. The choice is not between no-nonsense empiricism and evolutionary theory; it is between folk theory and evolutionary theory.
Research Interests: Cognitive Psychology, Cognitive Science, Epistemology, Semantics, Cognition, and 15 moreFolk Psychology, Adaptation, Theory, Attention, Research Agenda, Problem Solving, Social behavior, Humans, Animals, Instinct, Mental processes, Cognitive Theory, Biological evolution, Social Behavior, and Psychology and Cognitive Sciences
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Perhaps more than any other issue, questions about the nature and evolution of human intelligence and rationality have played a central organizing role in the development of evolutionary psychology. Indeed, how evolutionary ...
... Sell, A., Hagen, EH, Cosmides, L. and Tooby, J. 2006 ... Of course, all scientific fields from physics to geology also entertain new explanations for already known facts, and ... However, new theories for already known facts almost... more
... Sell, A., Hagen, EH, Cosmides, L. and Tooby, J. 2006 ... Of course, all scientific fields from physics to geology also entertain new explanations for already known facts, and ... However, new theories for already known facts almost always make new predictions that other theories do not ...
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Friendship and the Banker's paradox: Other pathways to the evolution of adaptations for altruism. J TOOBY, L COSMIDES Proceedings of the British Academy 88, 119-143, Oxford University Press, 1996. ...
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Third-party intervention, such as when a crowd stops a mugger, is common. Yet it seems irrational because it has real costs but may provide no personal benefits. In a laboratory analogue, the third-party-punishment game, third parties... more
Third-party intervention, such as when a crowd stops a mugger, is common. Yet it seems irrational because it has real costs but may provide no personal benefits. In a laboratory analogue, the third-party-punishment game, third parties ("punishers") will often spend real money to anonymously punish bad behavior directed at other people. A common explanation is that third-party punishment exists to maintain a cooperative society. We tested a different explanation: Third-party punishment results from a deterrence psychology for defending personal interests. Because humans evolved in small-scale, face-to-face social worlds, the mind infers that mistreatment of a third party predicts later mistreatment of oneself. We showed that when punishers do not have information about how they personally will be treated, they infer that mistreatment of other people predicts mistreatment of themselves, and these inferences predict punishment. But when information about personal mistreatment...
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We test the theory that shame evolved as a defense against being devalued by others. By hypothesis, shame is a neurocomputational program tailored by selection to orchestrate cognition, motivation, physiology, and behavior in the service... more
We test the theory that shame evolved as a defense against being devalued by others. By hypothesis, shame is a neurocomputational program tailored by selection to orchestrate cognition, motivation, physiology, and behavior in the service of: (i) deterring the individual from making choices where the prospective costs of devaluation exceed the benefits, (ii) preventing negative information about the self from reaching others, and (iii) minimizing the adverse effects of devaluation when it occurs. Because the unnecessary activation of a defense is costly, the shame system should estimate the magnitude of the devaluative threat and use those estimates to cost-effectively calibrate its activation: Traits or actions that elicit more negative evaluations from others should elicit more shame. As predicted, shame closely tracks the threat of devaluation in the United States (r = .69), India (r = .79), and Israel (r = .67). Moreover, shame in each country strongly tracks devaluation in the o...
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John Tooby Co-Director, Center for Evolutionary Psychology, University of California Santa Barbara, CA 93106-3210 [email protected] phone: 805 899-0067 Center fax: 805 965-1163 Center Web Page: http://www.psych.ucsb.edu/research ...
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Advocates of Darwinian approaches to the study of behavior are divided over what an evolutionary perspective is thought to entail. Some take "evolution-minded- ness" to mean "phylogeny-mindedness," whereas others take... more
Advocates of Darwinian approaches to the study of behavior are divided over what an evolutionary perspective is thought to entail. Some take "evolution-minded- ness" to mean "phylogeny-mindedness," whereas others take it to mean "adaptation- mindedness." Historically, comparative psychology began as the search for mental continuities between humans and other animals: aphylogenetic approach. Independently, ethologists and now behavioral ecologists have placed
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It was supposed to be an amicable "merger of equals," an example of European togetherness, a synergistic deal that would create the world's second-largest consumer foods company out of two former competitors. But the... more
It was supposed to be an amicable "merger of equals," an example of European togetherness, a synergistic deal that would create the world's second-largest consumer foods company out of two former competitors. But the marriage of entrepreneurial powerhouse Royal Biscuit and the conservative, family-owned Edeling GmbH is beginning to look overly ambitious. Integration planning is way behind schedule. Investors seem wary. But for Royal Biscuit HR head Michael Brighton, the most immediate problem is that he can't get his German counterpart, Dieter Wallach, to collaborate on a workable leadership development plan for the merged company's executives. And stockholders have been promised details of the new organizational structure, including a precise timetable, in less than a month. The CEO of the British company--and of the postmerger Royal Edeling--is furious. It's partly a culture clash, but the problems may run deeper than that. The press is harping on details...
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In making and applying law, many agents and institutions aim for some optimal solution, yet end up mired in complexity and inefficiency. Their decision-making processes may therefore be improved by the judicious use of simplifying... more
In making and applying law, many agents and institutions aim for some optimal solution, yet end up mired in complexity and inefficiency. Their decision-making processes may therefore be improved by the judicious use of simplifying heuristics. In this report we ex- amine some of the ways that heuristics might be used (and should not be used) in the cre- ation