In 1859, Charles Darwin proposed the modern theory of evolution, which after 150 years is still supported by science. Finally, an answer was given to questions about how and why animals have developed to look like they do today. Continued research on evolution provided more and more answers within animal biology and behaviour. The biggest question slowly came crawling: can what we learn about evolution and animals also apply to humans?

Natural selection is a mechanism where those organisms with the greatest ability for survival are those who pass on their genes. These abilities include behaviours, such as those increasing the chance of producing offspring with a partner. This course will look at applied evolution and how it has formed behavioural properties in both animals and humans. To what degree can our behaviour be explained by the environment or our genes? Primarily, questions regarding evolution and behaviour fall into two overlapping fields: behavioural ecology and evolutionary psychology.

Behavioural ecology is the study of animal behaviour in order to map evolutionary mechanisms. It covers concepts such as sexual behaviour, competition, intelligence, culture, and helping behaviour. The latter topic on helping behaviour, or altruism, was one of the greatest mysteries for Charles Darwin for a long time. If helping one animal comes at the cost of ones own life, how can such a behaviour come to be in the first place? It took over 100 years before the answer was found. Another question was the concept of designated sex: practically all animals are divided into sexes, but what is the point of having males and females? By studying the behaviour of animals we can gain a better understanding of evolutionary development and apply this knowledge to humans. If all animals follow specific principles, why would humans be any different?

Evolutionary psychology was established as a field in the 1990s, and focuses on how evolution can contribute towards explaining human behaviour. There are two areas that are researched particularly often: culture and sex/gender. A behaviour can have an evolutionary explanation if it is seen across cultures, because this would indicate that the behaviour is dominated by genes and not social influence from the environment. An example of sex research is that men find sexual infidelity more distressing than emotional infidelity (falling in love). This is best explained through evolution: if women are sexually unfaithful it creates uncertainty about who is the father of a child, while emotional infidelity does not involve this uncertainty. Even though men and women are more similar than dissimilar, knowledge about evolution can contribute towards explaining those gender differences that exist.

This course will provide a general introduction into evolutionary biology and natural selection, as well as specialist knowledge on how nature has formed behaviours in animals and humans. Some of the topics that will be looked at closely are sexuality, partner choice, helping behaviour, intelligence, culture, hunting strategies, a variety of different behaviours in animals and humans, as well as a discussion on nature and nurture.

Subject description 7141

Evolution and Behaviour in Animals and Humans

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