Reading Comprehension

PT134 · S4 · P3 · Q15 Evolutionary Psychology

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Passage A Evolutionary psychology has taught us to examine human behavior from the standpoint of the theory of evolution—to explain a given type of human behavior by examining how it contributes to the reproductive success of individuals exhibiting the behavior, and thereby to the proliferation of the genetic material responsible for causing that behavior.

Passage A

The first paragraph introduces us to the concept of Evolutionary Psychology, which tries to explain behaviors based on how they would have contributed to the reproductive success of the individual behaving that way.

At the end of the 1st, the author asks a Puzzling Question: how can altruism (self-sacrifice) help the reproductive success of an individual?

The 2nd paragraph begins, the answer probably lies in identification / empathy.

So our reading goal is to understand how identification/empathy make it so that altruism helps the reproductive success of an individual. The story seems to be that we can visually identify people who resemble us (and thus who are likely to share some of our genes), and this makes us empathize with them and want to help them more. In the end, I guess the explanation is that we learn to be altruistic to people who look like us, because if they are related to us, then saving them is technically helping the reproductive success of our genes (since they share many of our genes).

The 3rd paragraph is saying that once this mechanism existed (so that we'd be more likely to help our our genetic relatives), it got co-opted more socially within our kin-based groups turned into bigger groups that included non-relatives. Altruism may end up helping strangers in a way that looks "unselfish", but it arose for selfish reasons (trying to save "your genes" by helping someone near you who shared some of your genes).

Passage B

Right away we see there's a Topic Overlap with Evolutionary Psychology. However, this author seems to be against it, not using it. She calls it a "conspiracy theory", which sounds negative.

There's also some saucy attitude in the last sentence of the 1st paragraph: what seemed to be your unsurprising interest in your child's well-being turns out to be your genes' conspiracy to propagate themselves.

The author is saying,

In the 2nd paragraph, the author is providing an example of what she considers to be typical evolutionary psychology -- we have monogamous families (not for the superficial reason of "I found my one true love") because our offspring mature slowly so this type of family improved the reproductive chances of our offspring.

In the 3rd paragraph, the author continues her skepticism of this type of thinking. She feels like evolutionary psychologists are forcing everything through their explanatory lens, when there are other, possibly simpler and more intuitive ways to explain some forms of behavior.

She seems convinced that some of our behaviors are not controlled by genetic interests; they're just products of our own curious free will.

Overlap

Both passages deal with evolutionary psychology and with altruism.

Passage A presents how evolutionary psychology would explain altruism. Passage B alludes to it very vaguely at the end of its 3rd paragraph.

Divergence

Passage A seems to like / trust evolutionary psychology, whereas Psg B seems a little annoyed that evolutionary psychology insists on thinking that every single thing has an evolutionary explanation.

15.

According to passage B, which one of the following is an example of a human characteristic for which evolutionary psychologists propose a questionable explanation?

  1. the early human tendency to

    Out of Scope: small communities

    Not only is this not either of two things we're looking for, but Passage B doesn't ever talk about small communities. Only Passage A did in its final paragraph.

    0% picked this

  2. the slow maturation of human

    Unrelated to Goal

    This was stated in the 2nd paragraph, but there was never a "genetic explanation" offered for it. It's not a behavior or mindset like the two things we're looking for (monogamous family / care about kids). This is just a physiological fact, and so probably almost all people would agree that the trait of human offspring maturing slowly is a genetically determined trait.

    7% picked this

  3. Correct

    forming monogamous families

    Why this is right

    This is one of the two things we were looking for. In the 2nd paragraph, the final sentence says that evolutionary psychologists try to explain our preference for monogamous families "because of our interest in propagating our genes". We can see that the author considers this explanation questionable, because she immediately questions it! Are they right? Maybe yes, maybe no.

    Skill tested: Locate Detail · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.

    78% picked this

  4. misinterpreting the interests that motivate

    Not a Characteristic

    We were never told that "misinterpreting the interests that motivate human actions" is a human characteristic (i.e. applies to most/all humans). This language sounds more like something our author might say specifically about evolutionary psychologists. But this answer is saying, "Evolutionary psychologists think that the selfish motives of genes are responsible for ... the general human tendency to misinterpret the interests that motivate human actions."

    8% picked this

  5. caring for some things for

    Wasn't Explained

    We were never told that "caring for some things for their own sakes" was a typical human trait. However, the author does seem to be insinuating that in her final sentence. She's making it seem like it is a fact of human nature that some things we do are just for their own sake, not to improve our genes' chances of replicating. But we still can't pick this because the passage never offered an evolutionary psychologists' explanation for "why humans care about some things for their own sake". This answer is saying, "Evolutionary psychologists think that the reason humans tend to care for some things for their own sake is Reason X, but the author finds that explanation dubious." Evolutionary psychologists don't think we do anything for its own sake. They think that the benefit of our genes is behind everything we do. So it would be nonsensical for them to offer an explanation for why we often care about things for their own sake.

    7% picked this

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