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  1.  31
    Origins of music in credible signaling.Samuel A. Mehr, Max M. Krasnow, Gregory A. Bryant & Edward H. Hagen - 2021 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 44:e60.
    Music comprises a diverse category of cognitive phenomena that likely represent both the effects of psychological adaptations that are specific to music (e.g., rhythmic entrainment) and the effects of adaptations for non-musical functions (e.g., auditory scene analysis). How did music evolve? Here, we show that prevailing views on the evolution of music – that music is a byproduct of other evolved faculties, evolved for social bonding, or evolved to signal mate quality – are incomplete or wrong. We argue instead that (...)
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  2.  82
    Music and dance as a coalition signaling system.Edward H. Hagen & Gregory A. Bryant - 2003 - Human Nature 14 (1):21-51.
    Evidence suggests that humans might have neurological specializations for music processing, but a compelling adaptationist account of music and dance is lacking. The sexual selection hypothesis cannot easily account for the widespread performance of music and dance in groups (especially synchronized performances), and the social bonding hypothesis has severe theoretical difficulties. Humans are unique among the primates in their ability to form cooperative alliances between groups in the absence of consanguineal ties. We propose that this unique form of social organization (...)
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  3.  42
    Evolutionary Models of Leadership.Zachary H. Garfield, Robert L. Hubbard & Edward H. Hagen - 2019 - Human Nature 30 (1):23-58.
    This study tested four theoretical models of leadership with data from the ethnographic record. The first was a game-theoretical model of leadership in collective actions, in which followers prefer and reward a leader who monitors and sanctions free-riders as group size increases. The second was the dominance model, in which dominant leaders threaten followers with physical or social harm. The third, the prestige model, suggests leaders with valued skills and expertise are chosen by followers who strive to emulate them. The (...)
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  4.  43
    All Models Are Wrong, and Some Are Religious: Supernatural Explanations as Abstract and Useful Falsehoods about Complex Realities.Aaron D. Lightner & Edward H. Hagen - 2022 - Human Nature 33 (4):425-462.
    Many cognitive and evolutionary theories of religion argue that supernatural explanations are byproducts of our cognitive adaptations. An influential argument states that our supernatural explanations result from a tendency to generate anthropomorphic explanations, and that this tendency is a byproduct of an error management strategy because agents tend to be associated with especially high fitness costs. We propose instead that anthropomorphic and other supernatural explanations result as features of a broader toolkit of well-designed cognitive adaptations, which are designed for explaining (...)
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  5.  30
    Ethnomedical Specialists and their Supernatural Theories of Disease.Aaron D. Lightner, Cynthiann Heckelsmiller & Edward H. Hagen - 2023 - Review of Philosophy and Psychology 14 (2):611-646.
    Religious healing specialists such as shamans often use magic. Evolutionary theories that seek to explain why laypersons find these specialists convincing focus on the origins of magical cognition and belief in the supernatural. In two studies, we reframe the problem by investigating relationships among ethnomedical specialists, who possess extensive theories of disease that can often appear “supernatural,” and religious healing specialists. In study 1, we coded and analyzed cross-cultural descriptions of ethnomedical specialists in 47 cultures, finding 24% were also religious (...)
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  6.  47
    Fetal Protection.Caitlyn D. Placek & Edward H. Hagen - 2015 - Human Nature 26 (3):255-276.
    Pregnancy involves puzzling aversions to nutritious foods. Although studies generally support the hypotheses that such aversions are evolved mechanisms to protect the fetus from toxins and/or pathogens, other factors, such as resource scarcity and psychological distress, have not been investigated as often. In addition, many studies have focused on populations with high-quality diets and low infectious disease burden, conditions that diverge from the putative evolutionary environment favoring fetal protection mechanisms. This study tests the fetal protection, resource scarcity, and psychological distress (...)
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  7.  16
    Middle-earth wasn't built in a day: How do we explain the costs of creating a world?Aaron D. Lightner, Cynthiann Heckelsmiller & Edward H. Hagen - 2022 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 45:e286.
    Dubourg and Baumard explain why fictional worlds are attractive to consumers. A complete account of fictional worlds, however, should also explain why some people create them. Creation is a costly and time-consuming process that does not resemble exploration but does resemble the culturally universal phenomenon of knowledge specialization.
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  8.  61
    Psychological adaptations for assessing gossip veracity.Nicole H. Hess & Edward H. Hagen - 2006 - Human Nature 17 (3):337-354.
    Evolutionary models of human cooperation are increasingly emphasizing the role of reputation and the requisite truthful “gossiping” about reputation-relevant behavior. If resources were allocated among individuals according to their reputations, competition for resources via competition for “good” reputations would have created incentives for exaggerated or deceptive gossip about oneself and one’s competitors in ancestral societies. Correspondingly, humans should have psychological adaptations to assess gossip veracity. Using social psychological methods, we explored cues of gossip veracity in four experiments. We found that (...)
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  9.  89
    Gestures of despair and hope: A view on deliberate self-harm from economics and evolutionary biology.Edward H. Hagen, Paul J. Watson & Peter Hammerstein - 2008 - Biological Theory 3 (2):123-138.
    A long-standing theoretical tradition in clinical psychology and psychiatry sees deliberate self-harm , such as wrist-cutting, as “functional”—a means to avoid painful emotions, for example, or to elicit attention from others. There is substantial evidence that DSH serves these functions. Yet the specific links between self-harm and such functions remain obscure. Why don’t self-harmers use less destructive behaviors to blunt painful emotions or elicit attention? Economists and biologists have used game theory to show that, under certain circumstances, self-harmful behaviors by (...)
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  10.  29
    When Saying “Sorry” Isn’t Enough: Is Some Suicidal Behavior a Costly Signal of Apology?Kristen L. Syme & Edward H. Hagen - 2019 - Human Nature 30 (1):117-141.
    Lethal and nonlethal suicidal behaviors are major global public health problems. Much suicidal behavior (SB) occurs after the suicide victim committed a murder or other serious transgression. The present study tested a novel evolutionary model termed the Costly Apology Model (CAM) against the ethnographic record. The bargaining model (BRM) sees nonlethal suicidal behavior as an evolved costly signal of need in the wake of adversity. Relying on this same theoretical framework, the CAM posits that nonlethal suicidal behavior can sometimes serve (...)
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  11.  84
    Robustness: A Key to Evolutionary Design.Peter Hammerstein, Edward H. Hagen, Andreas V. M. Herz & Hanspeter Herzel - 2006 - Biological Theory 1 (1):90-93.
  12.  73
    The strategy concept and John Maynard Smith’s influence on theoretical biology.Manfred D. Laubichler, Edward H. Hagen & Peter Hammerstein - 2005 - Biology and Philosophy 20 (5):1041-1050.
    Here we argue that the concept of strategies, as it was introduced into biology by John Maynard Smith, is a prime illustration of the four dimensions of theoretical biology in the post-genomic era. These four dimensions are: data analysis and management, mathematical and computational model building and simulation, concept formation and analysis, and theory integration. We argue that all four dimensions of theoretical biology are crucial to future interactions between theoretical and empirical biologists as well as with philosophers of biology.
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  13.  40
    Correction to: Ethnomedical Specialists and their Supernatural Theories of Disease.Aaron D. Lightner, Cynthiann Heckelsmiller & Edward H. Hagen - 2022 - Review of Philosophy and Psychology 13 (2):523-523.
  14.  32
    The Biological Roots of Music and Dance.Edward H. Hagen - 2022 - Human Nature 33 (3):261-279.
    After they diverged from panins, hominins evolved an increasingly committed terrestrial lifestyle in open habitats that exposed them to increased predation pressure from Africa’s formidable predator guild. In the Pleistocene, _Homo_ transitioned to a more carnivorous lifestyle that would have further increased predation pressure. An effective defense against predators would have required a high degree of cooperation by the smaller and slower hominins. It is in the interest of predator and potential prey to avoid encounters that will be costly for (...)
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  15.  30
    Toward a productive evolutionary understanding of music.Samuel A. Mehr, Max M. Krasnow, Gregory A. Bryant & Edward H. Hagen - 2021 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 44:e122.
    We discuss approaches to the study of the evolution of music (sect. R1); challenges to each of the two theories of the origins of music presented in the companion target articles (sect. R2); future directions for testing them (sect. R3); and priorities for better understanding the nature of music (sect. R4).
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  16.  55
    Is excessive infant crying an honest signal of vigor, one extreme of a continuum, or a strategy to manipulate parents?Edward H. Hagen - 2004 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 27 (4):463-464.
    An evolutionary account of excessive crying in young infants – colic – has been elusive. A study of mothers with new infants suggests that more crying is associated with more negative emotions towards the infant, and perceptions of poorer infant health. These results undermine the hypothesis that excessive crying is an honest signal of vigor.
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  17.  22
    In Memoriam.Edward H. Hagen & Lawrence S. Sugiyama - 2020 - Human Nature 31 (1):9-21.
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  18.  43
    Response to Buller.Edward H. Hagen - 1998
    Buller recently posted a critique of evolutionary psychology (reproduced below). Although I disagree with many of his assertions, this is the most credible attempt to critique evolutionary psychology that I have encountered. Buller’s arguments regarding improper motivational inferences from evolutionary psychological explanations are largely correct--such inferences are indeed erroneous. Furthermore, the mistakes he identifies have been made by some prominent evolutionists including, apparently, W. D. Hamilton (Symons, personal communication). However, most evolutionary psychologists are not saying what he claims they are (...)
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  19.  48
    Special design's centuries of success.Edward H. Hagen - 2002 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 25 (4):519-520.
    The fitness maximization standard incorrectly assumes that most adaptations have high heritablility, and it imposes the difficult requirement that correlated phenotypic and environmental contributors to reproduction be controlled for. Despite infrequently recognized problems, the special design standard is the foundation of the spectacular successes of modern medicine. It also suggests that the ancestral environment provides a window into the functioning of the brain.
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  20.  44
    Sweet Savage love: FA, BO, and SES in the EEA.Edward H. Hagen & Nicole Hess - 2000 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 23 (4):604-605.
    Proxies of mate value must be evolutionarily salient. Gangestad & Simpson (G&S) have made a good case that fluctuating asymmetry is an important proxy of male mate value that correlates well with genetic and developmental quality. The use of financial variables as proxies for male investment ability by Gangestad, Simpson, and virtually every other investigator of human mating in evolutionary perspective, is, however, more problematic. Correspondence:a1 Address correspondence to the first author. Department of Anthropology, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA (...)
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  21.  28
    Mapping the terra incognita of economic cognition will require an experimental paradigm that incorporates context.Aaron D. Lightner & Edward H. Hagen - 2018 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 41:e178.
    Researchers, including Boyer & Petersen (B&P), commonly use experimental economic studies to draw their conclusions. These studies conventionally strip away context and present participants only with abstract rules. Because context is a strictly necessary component of the decision-making process, it is not clear that inferences about high-level folk psychological concepts (e.g., rationality) can be drawn from decontextualized economic games.
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  22.  78
    The Strategic View of Biological Agents.Peter Hammerstein, Edward H. Hagen & Manfred D. Laubichler - 2006 - Biological Theory 1 (2):191-194.
  23. Evolutionary psychology: Applications and criticisms.Aaron Sell, Edward H. Hagen, Leda Cosmides & John Tooby - 2003 - In L. Nadel (ed.), Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science. Nature Publishing Group.
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  24.  35
    But is it evolution…?Roger J. Sullivan & Edward H. Hagen - 2011 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 34 (6):322-323.
    We applaud Müller & Schumann (M&S) for bringing needed attention to the problem of motivation for common non-addictive drug use, as opposed to the usual focus on exotic drugs and addiction. Unfortunately, their target article has many underdeveloped and sometimes contradictory ideas. Here, we will focus on three key issues.
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