PSYCH 100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 6: Twin, Psych

• School: UMASS-Amherst
• Department: Psychology & Brain Sciences
• Course: PSYCH 100
• Professor: Rahhal Tamara

Document Summary

Explain human behaviors/traits by examining long-term reproductive advantages/disadvantages. Any 2 humans will have 0. 5% genetic variation (99. 5% similar) Example: men and women differ on willingness to have sex: men are less concerned about. Partner"s level of commitment: because women have fewer chances to bear offspring. Need to be more picky about choosing a mate. Wealth/status/power protect offspring and ensure survival to promote mother"s genes: meanwhile, men could have thousands of offspring. If one partner is bad, simply find another. Have as many kids as possible to promote genes. Problems with evolutionary psych: data are correlational can"t really run experiments, just so stories and backwards reasoning, there are variations in human behavior. An approach to understanding the extent to which behavior/trait differences can be attributed to genetic differences. Ways to investigate: twins raised together. Similarities between identical (100% genetic similarity)/fraternal twins (similarity of siblings) Found that identical twins are much more similar than fraternal.