•  20
    Violence, Teenage Pregnancy, and Life History
    with Lee T. Copping and Steven Muncer
    Human Nature 24 (2): 137-157. 2013.
    Guided by principles of life history strategy development, this study tested the hypothesis that sexual precocity and violence are influenced by sensitivities to local environmental conditions. Two models of strategy development were compared: The first is based on indirect perception of ecological cues through family disruption and the second is based on both direct and indirect perception of ecological stressors. Results showed a moderate correlation between rates of violence and sexual precoc…Read more
  •  21
    What kind of selection?
    Behavioral and Brain Sciences 32 (3-4): 272-273. 2009.
    Supporting a mediating role for fear in inhibiting female aggression, a recent study shows that aversion to impulsivity completely mediates the sex difference in direct aggression but not in angry acts where dangerous retaliation is unlikely. A more inclusive use of the term to encompass reproductive advantage would recognise females' crucial role in nurturing and protecting offspring
  •  41
    The Morning after the Night Before
    Human Nature 19 (2): 157-173. 2008.
    Benefits to females of short-term mating have recently been identified, and it has been suggested that women have evolved adaptations for this strategy. One piece of evidence supporting such a female adaptation would be that women find the experience of a one-night stand as affectively positive as men. Individuals (N = 1,743) who had experienced a one-night stand were asked to rate aspects of their “morning after” feelings (six positive and six negative). Women were significantly more negative a…Read more
  •  12
    Putting people before parasites and places
    Behavioral and Brain Sciences 23 (4): 596-597. 2000.
    The strategic pluralism model depends upon pathogen prevalence and environmental hardship being independent. Evidence is presented that they are positively correlated. The rise in short-term mating strategy in the United States is better explained by changes in the operational sex ratio than by increases in pathogen prevalence. Nonetheless, in highlighting the advantages of a high-investment strategy to less attractive males, Gangestad & Simpson's model helps to clarify the dynamics of frequency…Read more
  •  10
    Primacy of organising effects of testosterone
    with Steven Muncer and Josie Odber
    Behavioral and Brain Sciences 21 (3): 365-365. 1998.
    A test of a biosocial model is reported in which we found no impact of circulating testosterone on either status-seeking or aggression. The fact that sex differences in competitiveness and aggression appear in childhood strongly suggests that the major impact of testosterone is organisational. Whereas dominance and resources are linked among males, female aggression may be a function of pure resource competition, with no element of status-seeking.
  •  6
    Working with children and young people: ethical debates and practices across disciplines and continents (edited book)
    with Pat Broadhead and Avril Brock
    Peter Lang. 2010.
    This book provides an interdisciplinary perspective on working with young people, focusing on education, health and social work, and draws on projects and perspectives from the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada and Australia. The volume highlights the ethical challenges and dilemmas as these and other services are integrated and addresses how ethical practices are confronted and shared across disciplines.&ltBR> The first section looks at professional practice; the second foregrounds chil…Read more
  •  21
    When aggression is conceptualised in terms of a cost-benefit ratio, sex differences are best understood by a consideration of female costs as well as male benefits. Benefits must be extremely high to outweigh the greater costs borne by females, and circumstances where this occurs are discussed. Achievement of dominance is not such a circumstance and evidence bearing upon women's egalitarian relationships is reviewed. Attempts to explain sex differences in terms of sexual dimorphism, sex-of-targe…Read more
  •  22
    Maternal Competition in Women
    with Catherine Linney and Laurel Korologou-Linden
    Human Nature 28 (1): 92-116. 2017.
    We examined maternal competition, an unexplored form of competition between women. Given women’s high investment in offspring and mothers’ key role in shaping their reproductive, social, and cultural success as adults, we might expect to see maternal competition between women as well as mate competition. Predictions about the effect of maternal characteristics (age, relationship status, educational background, number of children, investment in the mothering role) and child variables (age, sex) w…Read more
  •  16
    Case Study: "The Child That Might Be Born..."
    with Louise M. Terry
    Hastings Center Report 32 (3): 11. 2002.
  •  74
    Staying alive: Evolution, culture, and women's intrasexual aggression
    Behavioral and Brain Sciences 22 (2): 203-214. 1999.
    Females' tendency to place a high value on protecting their own lives enhanced their reproductive success in the environment of evolutionary adaptation because infant survival depended more upon maternal than on paternal care and defence. The evolved mechanism by which the costs of aggression (and other forms of risk taking) are weighted more heavily for females may be a lower threshold for fear in situations which pose a direct threat of bodily injury. Females' concern with personal survival al…Read more
  •  55
    Sociopathy or hyper-masculinity?
    Behavioral and Brain Sciences 18 (3): 548-549. 1995.
    Definitional slippage threatens to equate secondary sociopathy with mere criminality and leaves the status of noncriminal sociopaths ambiguous. Primary sociopathy appears to show more environmental contingency than would be implied by a strong genetic trait approach. A reinterpretation in terms of hypermasculinity and hypofemininity is compatible with the data
  •  15
    Representations, repertoires and power: Mother-child conflict
    Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour 25 (1). 1995.
  •  14