ISS Quiz 2- ch. 4, 5, & 6

Reading system of the brain and fine tuning

-Italian and English use same brain region when reading which is left hemisphere (language and speech) -3 Areas: *Frontal lobe *Parietotemporal cortex *Temporal Lobes *Fine tuning of brain was different but french was similar with english

Legacy of the Alphabet

-Learning the alphabet is the basis of literacy -Chinese poems are renowned for their layers of meaning -Japanese children must learn 3 writing systems; Chinese logographic system (Kanji), Japanese syllabary system (kana), Roman alphabet system (romaji) *Better for dyslexic people to use syllabary system because it is easier for them -Alphabetic writing system not the simplest to learn -Phonemes: tiny speech fragments -1st invention of alphabet: introduce symbols for consonants and is credited to Phoenicians of the Mediterranean coast -Greeks must be credited with the second big invention of the alphabet, introduction of graphic signs for vowels -Atticus may be the first dyslexic recorded in history -Learning the alphabet is still the basis of literacy -Learning the alphabet is not equally easy for everybody -Easier than symbols: only challenging letter re mirror letters (b, d, p, q) -Origin= phoenician and greek scribes borrowed and modified shapes from Egyptian hieroglyphics Herodes Atticus- a wealthy patron of the arts in ancient Greece, hired 24 slaves, each given the name of a letter to help his son learn the alphabet

Male Influence

-Male care is essential in all the Callitrichids -Three of the four genera (Callithrix jacchus, Saquinus mystax, leontopithecus) -The more males in the group the higher a mother's reproductive success -Extra males help to carry the infants and provide solid food

Mother & Young

-Mother and children cannot be considered apart rom shelter and food as long as a LARGER social framework exists -One absolute Constant (never changing) is that a mother NEEDS assistance as seen in cooperative breeders -Women are flexible and opportunistic when it comes to person who will be providing the help needed Mothers commitment to her baby is the most important factor in determining survival prospects for her child Bother a mothers commitment to her any and the level of support that she is able to provide to her any are directly linked to how much octal support that the mother receives A mothers love is contingent on her won circumstances

Mathematics

-Multiplication is processed in the brain like vocabulary in langue -Gender differences: *woman better at verbal tasks, men at spatial tasks *men brain activity is asymmetrical, and women uses citation of both sides *Linked with hormonal differences +testosterone increases spatial memory During multiplication there is a shift in brain activation toward the left hemisphere whereas, during comparison, activation is in both hemispheres with a slight preference for the right Multiplication, not comparison, is dependent on regions in the left hemisphere that are associated with language Boys have historically often outperformed girls on math, and girls generally do better at languages than boys in exams

How is Dyslexia Recognized

-No unique biological marker for dyslexia exists *understanding the specific brain functions that underline dyslexia will allow researchers to come up with better diagnostic tests for younger children -Strongly heritable condition -There are many reasons for difficulties in learning to read and write, other than a subtle abnormality in brain development

Teaching Dyscalculic Children Math

-Patient and slow repetition of foundational skill -Providing detailed rules -Involves major effort but in the end the individual will be able to perform and check basic operations

Folk Systems

-Plasticity Crystallized intelligence: the knowledge acquired during an individuals life time -network of systems that support fully developed competencies -modular plasticity enables the formation of crystalized knowledge Modular plasticity allows the formation of crystallized intelligence through the production of new neural pathways in the brain

Delinquency

-Social science uses the medical model of disease to describe behavioral pathology Many types of delinquency are status offenses and often not considered to be offenses for adults Decline of contact with kin may be the cause for much of the delinquency in US Less family time is party due to long hours of work (US individuals work more than individuals in other countries Father absence is another factor that contributes to delinquency in the US

Contextual Freedom in Human Infant Vocalization and the Evolution of Language

-Steps of Vocal Evolution -Every scientist who studied communication from the Enlightenment to the present has acknowledged that there is an enormous gap in type and degree of vocal communicative control manifest in human language compares with the natural communicative systems of any other primate -The lack of species showing intermediate degrees of communicative capability, presents a major obstacle -A series of steps that appear universally to characterize normal infant vocal development are thought to offer clues regarding the steps that our hominid ancestors may have taken -The approach presented is based in long-standing assumptions inherent to evolutionary theory *A key is the notion of descent with modification *Major changes of design in morphology or behavior are unlikely to occur in single leaps but are instead evolved systematically, where each step provides a modification built upon the foundations of prior evolutionary steps, each with is own fitness advantage at the time it is taken -The view that the whole of language capability must have evolved in a sudden burst of change corresponding to the Upper Paleolithic is seen as extremely unlikely due to the principle of descent with modification is observed in evolution The assumption, then, is that there were too many steps of descent with modification that must have taken to provide foundations for language, perhaps over hundreds of thousands or even millions of years Research n infant vocalization and young child speech has revealed many steps of development it also highlights the extent to which those changes reveal successive stages of power in communication -The very early stages of vocal development in the human show ways in which the infant communicates vocally with potential survival advantages for the infant and further development reveals growth in communication with further increasing potential survival advantages -The key matters to address concerns: *The nature of the very earliest step of differentiation in vocal communication of the hominid line from its pan-primate background *the initial conditions that led to the break Oller has contended that the most fundamental logical requirement of the break with the primate background was the evolution of vocal "contextual Freedom" and that all other steps of vocal evolution toward language were dependent upon that initial step

Why don't subordinate females breed themselves?

-The alpha males would probably destroy her young -The subordinate female could then become a wet nurse (this lead sot the threat of postponing or suppressing ovulation)

Bonobos of Holland

-The bonobo mother was not able to feed her self and hold her baby at the same time -To allow her self to eat and keep her baby safe the bonobo mother moved away from the other bonobos and set her baby down -The mother only allowed herself to eat after her baby was guaranteed safety while doing so

Allomothers

Neural and endocrine systems need to be in police and activated for nursing *when activated lead to nurturing Need to be susceptible to infant charms and solicitations, amenable to priming *why infants are attractive Allomothers have become more sensitive to the tantalizing signals babies emit Defined as non-maternal infant care that can be done by a father or other family member

Sexual Promiscuity

Not pathological if viewed in cross cultural perspective Parents tend to restrict sexuality in cultures where bride prices are high

Tentative Conclusions on Vocal Contextual Freedom in Nonhuman Primates

Vocal Contextual Freedom can be achieved by nonhuman primates in many instances given the right circumstances of living Interpretation: much greater flexibility (does not appear to occur in production and usage) Nonhuman primate listeners learn to respond adaptively to vocal signals and other actions of a variety of species

Getting through the Bottleneck to Vocal Contextual Freedom

Vocalization and related visual displays were most powerful available possible tools to evolve toward social enhancement, we propose, and the young of the species were thus under selection pressure to develop the capability and the motivation to vocalize in a extremely elaborate social manner in order to elicit investment from their caregivers

Variability in Context

When context (conditions) vary across generations, then domain-general (less modularized) mechanisms are likely to emerge Static conditions result in modularized brain and cognitive systems and dynamic conditions result in domain-general systems Plasticity within modularized domains reflects general fluid intelligence gF

En face Socializing

When the baby gazes deeply into their mothers eyes, like lovers in the early phase of a relationship

Communal rearing

allows colonies to focus their efforts on raising more viable offspring Can also focus more on things like making honey and hunting Chimp mothers carry young with them until there is another safe alternative

Emotional Habits

being able to notice what others feel and need, caring about them, and being able to respond to them are learned in the first 3 years of life

Folk Psychology

made up of affective, cognitive and behavioral parts that help people negotiate social interactions and relations. Has the domains of self relationships and interactions -Fok Biology: essence, flora, fauna -Folk Physics: movement, representation, tool use

Window for Language

remains open until age 7 and slowly closes as advancing to puberty **Nicaragua

FOX P2

specifically involved in human speech and language development 2 strains = normal 1 strain = impaired Synaptic Plasticity in the Striatum- increased long term depression in humans & reduced in mice

Compassion

taking an interest in all the details of other peoples existences and understating fears and motives, their longings and griefs and vanities. being able cognitively and emotionally to put oneself in someone else's shows and article compassion is uniquely human Emotional, empathetic component is to some degree heritable -identical twins showed more similar reactions at 14 months than fraternal twins Learned component: Analytical skills are used to look at the world from anthers perspective -learned from earliest relationships to mother figures -learned while learning to trust other people Uniquely human

Psychometric tests that index gC

testing vocab, fluency of words, spelling, reading, and listening comprehension

Dominance in Leadership

"Dominant individuals tend to attract others attention because subordinates need to monitor this sense of threat" Dominant attractive individuals are typically more self-confident, outgoing, socially competent leaders

Brain Size

"The bigger the better" Larger brain volumes associated with larger gF, short-term memory capacity, and faster speed of processing The same brain systems that underlie working memory and explicit controlled problem solving are engaged when people solve items on measure of gF The core of a mental model is the generation of a "perfect world" Larger brains are associated with better short term memory, faster processing and a higher gF Brain imaging studies support the idea that "the same brain systems that underlie working memory and explicit controlled problem solving are engaged when people solve items on measure of gF

Vocal Contextual Freedom in the Human Infant

-"Phonation" stage Infants show the ability to produce well-formed normal phonation -"Primitive Articulation" stage Infants show the ability therein to produce articulation while phoning -"Expansion" stage Infants engage in active exploration of the vocal capability

Evolution of Humans

-6 Bilion people currently live on earth -Humans are hunters and gatherers *This is why we remember the rings people do for us -Our ancestors were Homo erg aster's We are Homo-sapiends -In the first 3 yrs of your life you learn what others feel and need and you care about them

Fixed Signal

-A concept that is generally presumed, with some qualifications, to characterize the communicative vocalizations of nonhuman primate species -Fixed vocal signals referred to as "calls" *presumed to occur in the context of specific social or emotional conditions -Presumed one-to-one relation in fixed signals *each signal type has one and only one function (although the functions may be broadly defined and applied) *each function corresponds to one and only one signal type -Decoupled vocalization are not "calls" *because they possess the potential for serving a variety of functions -Exemplification *bears the same semantic content as it does when it serves as a warning, but it has a different illocutionary force -English speaking natives can produce a sentence in whatever situation they choice invoking its semantic content -A particular utterance can have multiple functions, a one to many mapping of signal to function -Each of the functions noted could also be served as a wide variety of different utterances -The point of examples is that human language is not limited to having a single utterance or sentence (semantic content) that serves each function -Human language presents the potential of a menu to one mapping for any function -Requirements: *The signals themselves must each be mapped to one function and that function must be itself clear and have a clearly social nature *Each is easily identifiable and the sounds must not be too variable in acoustic character -Purposes listed by basic social interaction: *Threat, alarm, invitation, contact, distress calling

Nonhuman Primate Sounds

-A humanlike degree of contextual freedom has never been reported for any nonhuman primate vocal system -Generalized Contextual Freedom requires that sounds be producible in any circumstance -Seyfarth and Cheney (3 different ways to look at the degree of fixity in nonhuman primate vocal system 1) The vocal signals themselves which indicate the production capability (Degree of Vocal Signal Fixity = high) >sounds can mature from immature to mature forms > sharp limited range of sound categories produced at all ages >some shift in the acoustic characters of fixed signals may be possible with experience but it is subtle 2)The way each signal type functions which indicates the usage capability (Degree of usage fixity for various signals = not entirely fixed) -All primate sounds types are modified with time in accord with experience -Babbling matures into adult sounds (marmoset) 3)The way listeners of the species respond to the signals when they are heard ( degree of fixity in listener respond = low) -extraordinary levels of freedom in how listeners respond to vocalization or other sounds -Macaques can interpret the sound system of other species but cannot produce the sounds Their research suggests that nonhuman primates show substantial ability to respond adaptively to the vocalization of their species and other species even when the responses clearly have to be learned. However they are fixed in their ability to produce sounds and pair those used sounds with particular functions

Corpus Callosum

-A mass of fibers that lies in the middle of the brain and connects two hemispheres, allowing them to communicate with each other instantly and continuously -Continually comparing and processing info that is transferred from one side of the brain to the other by a mass of fibers connecting the two hemispheres *Right hemisphere is unable to identify written numeral such as "sixty-five" *Both hemispheres are able to recognize and compare digits *although patients with parietal lobe damage have serious problems with recognizing and calculating numbers, they often have fewer problems when something nonnumeric has some kind of numerical order *generally, damage to the visual cortex on the left side of the brain causes problems in word reading, whereas damage to visual cortex on the right side causes problems in digit reading Mr.M (large brain hemorrhage): incapable of performing simplest sum, unable to recognize numbers visually, impossible to retrieve and name numbers from presentation of a digit or a questions requiring an exact answer, does not have same problems in estimating quantities, lost calculation abilities, not harmed his ability to approximate, no longer able to imagine numbers as representation in space on a number line to subtract and add. Exact calculation is dependent on language, approximation relies on nonverbal visual and spatial brain networks

School and Work

-Important because school and work let people control resources -Higher IQ generally means more success in modern workforce -Fluid intelligence is the single best predictor of occupational success

Alarm Calls in Nonhuman-Vervet Monkey

-Alarm vocalization somewhat flexible for various primate species in that the young tend to become more accurate with time in the usage of these calls in appropriate circumstances, there are reported audience effects such that the issuance of an alarm call appears to be context of interactions with humans, instrumental conditioning may sometimes occur with the effect of fundamentally altering certain call function -Greater Accuracy of Usage of Alarm Cllas with Time (not fixed in final form at birth in many primate but fixed later on) *the young Vervet produce an eagle sound when they see birds meaning they need to go through learning regarding what to be alarmed about. The fixity of the signal can be seen as only marginally challenging by the observation of this sort of development *with time the context of danger that inspires the warning call is defined more precisely *the function cannot be changed from a warning to a greeting -Audience effects in the usage of alarm calls (fixed because the spun remains an alarm call and not a greeting) *when kin are near the alarm call is produced with greater likelihood *solitary animals do not produce alarm calls *allows for increased survival chance of callers kin and genes -The possibility of altered usage in alarm calls *cebus has been decoupled and recouped at lease one signal and function because the alarm bark serves a different function then it would in the wild *attempts to train chimps to vocalize in ways resembling speech have limited success indicating some growth of vocal contextual freedom *primates could learn new usages for sounds through operant conditioning -Vocal Contextual Freedom can be achieved by nonhuman primates given the right circumstances -Primates can recognize vocal signals and hand gestures -Babies don't produce well-formed sounds until after 6 months typically -First sound type by children = quasi vowel -"Phonation" stage = when infants show the ability to produce well-formed normal phonation -Infants use quasi vowels with longer phoned vocalizations in face-to-face interactions by the second month -"Primitieve Articulation" stage = infants show the ability to produce some articulation -Face-to-face interactions create a bonding -"Expansion" stage = = in fats engage in active exploration of vocal capability -Sound categories are used with positive, neutral and negative expressive valences -It is believed that humans are the only species to speak is because of a sort of evolutionary bottleneck -Those animals that were able to sounds more detectably and more unambiguously were able to warn the group more effectively,allowing the group to sustain life better

Cooperative Breeding and Philopatry

-Beings with offspring staying newer to mothers in philopatric associations (greek for loving ones natal place-"home county" -Benefits: *Remain safe in known/home territory *able to take advantage of remaining near family/resources: safe shelter, food, and stored food

History of Writing

-Believed to be one of the greatest cultural inventions of mankind/human history -Started in Mesopotamia and in China 5,000 Years ago -Very ancient examples are pictorial -Useful when laws were being formed -Does not convey same things speech conveys, such as stress patterns of words: transmits only certain aspects of language and not others: no melody or prosody in written language -Before writing there was only spoke language, but only writing leaves permanent record -First big invention of the alphabet creating symbols to represent consonants -Second big invention was the introduction of graphics for vowels

Cognitive Development and Modular Plasticity

-Cognitive development is the experience-driven adaption of biologically primary modular competencies to the nuances of the local, social, biological, and physical ecologies *Social play and exploration of the ecology -Modular systems should be plastic or open to experiential modification -Folk Psychology- the strong bias of human infants to attend to human faces, movement patterns, and speech reflects -Folk Biology and Folk Physics- The complexity of hunting and foraging activities varies with the ecology in which the group lives, a situation that should select for plasticity in the associated brain, cognitive, and behavioral systems Folk Biology module- categorization of flora and fauna Folk physical Module- guides movement (including mental representation ) in 3-D physical space *example: folk physics is the ability to mentally form a map-like representation of the large-scale environment - A long development period is an evolved feature of human life history and appears to function to enable the fleshing out of folk modules and knowledge

Contextual Freedom as Possibly the Earliest Step in the Hominid Break

-Contextual freedom in vocalization is the capability to produce sounds that are free of specific stimulus conditions or requirements of function -Signals and functions are coupled -Vocal contextual freedom --> each sound can be produced at will and consequently is available for adaption -Contextual freedom is systematic

Dyslexia

-Genetic origin and basis in the brain causing difficulties in learning to read and write Three parts of reading system of left hemisphere are activated during normal reading but only two are activated in dyslexics- missing temporal cortex activation: understanding whole words -Dyslexia might also cause problems with remembering and repeating speech, hearing, attention deficit disorders, and visual problems -Compensatory learning can happen, but the underlying problem never goes away -Children and adults with dyslexia find it difficult to process and classify language sounds * The impairment in phonology (processing the sounds of words and learning what each sound means) is thought to be due to a subtle abnormality in brain development, and directly linked to poor learning of both spoken and written language -Neurologist Al Galaburda found that small clusters of nerve cells in dyslexic brains were not in the right place *During early development, some cells wandered to the top layer of the cortex and were visible as minute scars **Scars common in medial temporal regions, the center of the reading system, which is also concerned with speech processing ***possible that these scars have some role in causing dyslexia and in addition, visual, auditory, and motor impairments -The layer of white matter, which lies underneath the brain surface and contains all myelin-covered fibers that connect nerves together, is thinner in the brain's reading system in dyslexics -During reading, dyslexics have reduced activation in the major components of the reading and speech-processing system of the left hemisphere of the brain -Affects 5 percent of the population and runs in families -May have something to do with language and verbal memory -In addition to dyslexia some also have *attention deficits *Visusal problems *Hearing problems *These problems are just in addition to dyslexia, not because of it -Porbablity of a child having dyslexia if their parent has dyslexia is 25-50%-No cure -Training the brain helps in preventing the effects -Possible to strengthen different parts of brain particularly regions that deal w/ speech sounds -Primary learning block to learning to read and write is to do with speech; many dyslexic children indeed also have doe problems in spoken language and verbal memory -10-60% of dyslexic children have additional visual, hearing, or movement difficulties -Do not grow out of being dyslexic, reading usually remains slow and effortful; spelling almost always remains error-prone

Parietal Lobe

-Highly activated after people are taught to read and play music -Specializes in locating objects in space and time and how they relate to math and magnitude -Preexisting specialization -Heavily used in calculation *exact calculation is dependent on language and approximation relies on nonverbal visual and spatial brain sections *calculations slower in second language where as approx. was equal in time in both languages *gender and math = not biological *Gap between boys and girls has been reduced by half over past 30 yrs *There are size differences of sections of the brains between men and women. Emotional section larger in women, much overlap between genders Divided into superior (higher) and inferior (lower) sections is involved in spatial manipulations and in arithmetic and number understanding -People who have spatial ability on aptitude tests often have good magical skills as well -High correlations between mathematical abilities and spatial ability on aptitude tests Ability to compare numbers depends on a nonverbal representational system located primarily in the parietal lobe- both hemispheres are capable of doing the job of comparing and estimating numbers

Wet Nurses

-Humans recognize ovulation and lactating pattern -Leads to have "allomothers" -Allomothers = wet nurses -Allomothers are just as decayed as a biological mother would be

Evolution of General Intelligence

-The brain and cognitive mechanisms that enable the explicit representation of information in working memory appear to underlie the ability to acquire biologically secondary competencies -The evolutionary function of general intelligence, the component cognitive abilities, and supporting brain regions is to cope with the unpredictability that results from fluctuating social and ecological conditions -Psychometric Research: *all branches of intellectual activity have in common one fundamental function *first ability: crystallized intelligence (gC) *second ability: fluid intelligence (gF) - Cognitive Research: *intelligence is related to the speed and accuracy with which social or ecological info is identified and then processed by the associated brain and cognitive systems

Efe of Central America

-The fee pass around infants among group members on the first day of life -By weeks of age, babies are with allomothers 40% of daytime and with mothers the rest -By 18 weeks of age, babies are with allomothers 60% of the time -Infants average 14 different caretakers -Similar child care patterns have been reported for other foraging people. Yet the chimp like pattern of mother exclusively has been considered the normal one -Like humans did thousands of years ago, the fee people hunt small prey as a community using nets -On the first day of an infant's life the baby is passed around the members of the group -Babies are with allomothers 40% of the time at only 3 weeks old. By 18 weeks the infants are taken care of by allomothers 60% of the time -Infants on average are taken care of by 14 different care takers, including family and unrelated people living in the village

Learning to Read

-The lengthy process of learning to read involves a switch in activity from right to left -Increased activity in left hemisphere dealing with reading-specific tasks *activity in the left hemisphere increases with age during a reading task, whereas activity declines in right hemisphere areas during the same time period -Decreased activity in right hemisphere only contributing minor visual aspects of text -After learning to read the brain does "automatic reading"- reading is automatic *stroop paradigm by dutch psychologist *reading is brainwashing -What budding readers need to learn, and indeed have to be taught to learn, is the mapping between sounds and lets; this is the main responsibility of the regions around the angular gyrus and the planum temporal of the left temporal lobe

Wernicke's Area, Angular Gyrus, Broca's area

-The middle area of the reading system comprises of Wernicke's Area and the Angular Gyrus -The area that was damaged in patients who could speak but not understand language is known as Wernicke's Area -Patients with damage at the base of the temporal lobe had a difficult time spelling and recognizing words -The reading system can be divided into 3 parts Broca's, Area, Wernickes area, and the Angular Gyrus -Frontal part (Broca's) is brains basic speech production system: production of language *in the cerebral cortex in the lower left frontal lobe -Middle part (Wernicke's and angular gyrus) activates during translation of letters and sounds *Planum temporale (part of enriches) *Bigger on left side of brain because of speech *more activated during language tasks in men -Wernicke's located in temporal lobe- usually on left side *area of the brain functions together w/ broca's area and is responsible for comprehension of speech -Back area (bottom of temporal lobe) involved in storage and retrieval of whole words, word form area

Changes in the Brain After Learning to Read

-The right superior parietal cortex was activated after the participants learned to read and play music *Reading music skill must have taken advantage of preexisting skills *Activiation of parietal lobe was due to training and not change of task *learning to read music also stimulated part of the parietal lobe that shows these students were ready to play the musical notes they were learning *activation was indeed due to training and not to change in task Stroop Paradigm- note indicates lets on the keyboard, the numbers indicate which fingers should be used. Upper line finger numbers are congruent while lower line are incongruent. ignoring musical notion and using finger notion Reading induced neural activity in left hemisphere Activity increased in older readers and within each age group was greater for the more advanced readers Activity declined in right hemisphere Left brain structures become increasingly tuned to reading specific tasks while the right hemisphere contributions (processing visual aspects of text) become less important Left hemisphere regions- activity increased most with increasing reading skill

Steps of Vocal Evolution

-There is any enormous gap in type and degree of vocal communicative control manifest in human language compared with the natural communicative systems of any other primate -A key is the notion of decent with modification -Major changes of design in morphology or behavior are unlikely to occur in single leaps--> instead are evolved systematically -Crucially, the very early stages of vocal development in the human show ways in which the infant communicates vocally with potential survival advantages for the individual infant

Growing Vocal System

-Used as a display method for a variety of social purposes, such as perhaps increasingly subtle means of appeasement, greeting, affection, and even entertainment -The vocal gifts of evolving hominids must have given them an edge over competitors species and subspecies, presumably because more vocal groups could work together more effectively in many realms of food acquisitions and defense

Learning to Read Words & Learning to Read in Classrooms

-When reading, the left hemisphere is stimulated while the right brain deceases in stimulation *greater stimulus as difficulty of reading increases *learning to read involves a switch in activity from right to left *To best teach children, combine attention to spoken words and mapping of letters and their sounds *Some children are not ready for this when they start school *It is easier to teach children at the ages of 7-9 to start spelling

How much vocal contextual freedom occurs in nonhuman primates?

1) Degree of Vocal signal Fixity: "most vocalization types are easily identifiable" at different ages but some show 'modification during development" 2) Degree of usage Fixity for Various Signals: As infants, sounds can be used differently, but as they get older, they learn the hierarchy and the basis of appropriate use of different sounds 3) Degree of Fixity in Listener Response: learn to respond to vocal signals even from different species in some cases

An explicated example: Alarm Calls in Nonhuman Primates

1) Greater Accuracy of usage of Alarm Calls with imd: the fact that "infants need to go through learning regarding what to be alarmed about" 2) Audience Effects in the Usage of Alarm Calls: it has been seen "that animals have the ability to inhibit alarm calls for self-protection" 3) The Possibility of Altered Usage in Alarm Calls: talks about how someone or something learns when an alarm call is actually listened to by others, so it sometimes gets used to get attention, rather tag not draw attention to an alarming matter

Free expressivity

A special kind of contextual freedom that is the ability to use a particular sound in the context of different states of arousal or affectivity

Testosterone

After a baby is born, the father of that child experienced a 30% drop in testosterone Declining testosterone might increase "paternal" behaviors by reducing male involvement in other behaviors, such as competing with other males, that might divert the parents from nurturing Proximity and involvement can elicit nurturing In relation to men's competitive behavior

Brain and Mind

Allows us to mold responses to information and conditions that co-vary with survival -includes information patterns that "exercise" and develop area of brain responsible for cognition -Includes subconscious awareness and processing

Nurturing Responses

Although its not impossible, it is tough to draw out nurturing responses from a prereproductive (prepubertal) female or male rather than from a recent mother A virgin female or male will eventually respond to a baby in need This is why there are common cases of adoptions among abandoned babies left in the forest

Synchronization

Appears to occur through neural connections that communicate back and forth between different brain regions, creating feedback cycles

Hypotheses on Bowlby

Babies are monitoring mothers to gain info about their social world Babies who used their mothers as a cue to determining the kid of world they had been born into, and who developed accordingly might have a survival advantage Over the last tens of thousands of years, survival chances of infants generally go up

Primed

Being presented with something over and over again until it becomes sensitive to the pupil signals An example of this is when male mice encounter a strange pup which they can either ignorer eat, When primed, they quit cannibalizing and start care taking Primed males do just about everything mothers do short of lactating

Ancient Hominids

Bipedal and their pelvic structure would not allow birth of an infant with a large brain Required selection for mechanisms for changing in the development until after birth

Clan Based Polyandry

Central Africa and Asia If husband dies his real and fictional brothers look after his children Same outcome as polyandry advantages

Amygdala

Consists of a pair of almost shaped structures that are formed by masses of nuclei The amygdala is positioned deep within the temporal lobes Associated with selection of which memorie are stored (especially emotional memories) and the location they are stored in the brain One of the primary function of the amygdala is control of fear responses Research has been conducted to study the effects of stimulating the amygdla during local anesthesia surgery. When the amygdala is stimulated, the patient reports feelings of imminent danger Destroying an animals amygdala has disastrous effects on tis natural alarm system. But that does not make the amygdala the "fear center" because the amygdala also has connections coming in from and going out to several other parts of the brain, all of which also are needed to manifest fear In humans, amygdala and orbitofrontal cortex of the brain are associated with dominant behavior (larger in women) *have strong involvement in emotional processing in social nonsocial contexts Mens brain are more voluminous in temporal lobes- amygdala and hippocampus As anxiety levels rise in response to stressors amygdala approaches high anxiety zone> can get stuck here causing: panic problems, phobias, and disturbing thoughts> to reverse changes: linden method> once subconscious has new set of rules it can't turn back

What is contextual freedom and in what sense is it a logical requirement for any sort of growth toward a linguistic system?

Contextual Freedom in vocalization is the capability to produce sounds that are free of specific stimulus conditions or requirements of function -By definition, every communicative act consists of an action that signals a function. There isa always a distinction to be drawn between the signal itself and the function it serves Without contextual freedom signals and functions are coupled and whenever a particular signal is delivered, it transmits the same potential function Contextual freedom is systematic (reliably nonrandom) alternation among classes in uninterrupted sequences, also in circumstances of isolation and neutral emotionality Contextual freedom s, thus, the the foundation upon which every step towards words is built. Domain specificity in the functions of a small number of preset signals cannot give way to domain generality of an unlimited number of signals that can be attached through learning to new functions(as in speech)

Males vs Females (fighting & not)

Criteria for dominance varies across culture In general, mass display self-confident attributions Women are more often attracted to male-dominance traits Men typically respond to aggression with fighting -physiological changes that involve the sympathetic nervous system and adrenal cortex Females respond with physiological demobilization conductive to protecting offspring -involved release of hormone "oxytocin"

Losing working memory as we age

Dealing with Prefrontal Cortex- most evolved, working memory, executive functions: overcome distractions & interferences, organize & multitask, etc. Neural Bases- network firing of higher cognition -weaker firing with advanced age -can be restored be giving optimal neurochemical environment Prefrontal Cortical Networks -excite each other through synaptic connections on Spines -spines: small protrusions specialized for receiving information -with advancing age or young stress exposure = build up of second messenger called cyclic-amp (cAMP) -cAMP: open nearby ion channels and weaken network connection -Guanfacine: inhibits cAMP- strengthen network firing in the aged neurons

Delayed Maturation and Phenotypic Flexibility

Delayed Maturation: prereproductive group members, such as teenagers and uncles, help group members with raising the young Phenotypic Flexibility: the ability to shift into different modes (ex: helpers to breeders) if the opportunity should arise "heart of cooperative breeding" While group members can be helpers at one time in life, they must be prepared (morphologically, physiologically, and behaviorally) to take on the role of a breeder if needed An example of a mammal exhibiting phenotypic flexibility: The role of young group members in a wolf pack is to help the alpha female raise her children. The younger wolfs will hunt and kill prey, eat it and make their way back to the den. The helpers will regurgitate the meal for the babies to eat. And in some cases, the young helper female will experience a pseudo pregnancy. Her belly will swell as if she were carrying pups, and she will produce milk. This milk can be given to other babies. And if the time should come, they younger helper females will still be able to reproduce

Alan Dixson

Discovered that male marmosets carrying babies had higher levels of prolactin than did males not exposed to babies The first reaction was skepticism A few years later it became clear that elevated prolactin levels can be found in any allomothers nurturing immatures, not just in genetic parents (shifting from the idea that "nurturing instinct" are confined only to mothers Main Point: Both sexes not just mothers, are prim able in the sense that their thresholds for responding to infants will be lowered by proximity an involvement can elicit nurturing

Dominance in Females

Dominance, popularity and leadership in adolescent girls are related to attractiveness Females generally do not fight for rank Females who are aggressive are generally less popular Females tend to use criticism, gossiping, and shunning instead

Dominance Hierarchy Model

Dominant simians exhibit dominant display in behavior and posture Subordinate simians exhibit the opposite displays that reflect submission

Drug Use

Drugs are stigmatized primarily because they are used by minority groups Drugs are used more by unhappy individuals Societies with a major drug problem presumably have a high number of unhappy people War on drugs actually places more emphasis on drug problems and adds financial value to the both dealing drugs and prosecuting for drug use Medical Approach: some societies view drug addiction as a medical problem and treat it accordingly without stigmatizing the addicts

Does Brain reading system depend on Language of Reader

English, Italian, and French use same alphabet -English has different rules for specific sounds in words -Italian: what you see is what you say, sound out the letters

Bowlby's Research

Evolutionary-minded developmentalists speculate that infants are monitoring mothers and other caretakers and that caretakers should take into consideration the world that the child has been born into Aware that there would have been pitifully little opportunity for infants to survive among Pleistocene foragers the attachment theory sociologists have evolved the theory in the last 20 years Baby's think can i found on my mother to survive? or should i just take what i need anyway i can get it. Pathological traits may actually be adaptive traits Infant Survival to some extent has become decoupled Pleistocene mother was embedded in social relationships

Executive Function

Executive function relates to several abilities -ability to foresee consequences for behavior -ability to distinguish good vs. bad and right vs. wrong -ability to establish goals -ability to maintain self-control and suppress undesirable behavior

Female Inhibitions

Females sometimes lower their abilities in the presence of male opponents Adult women act more submissively in mixed groups Women who feel superior to a man might handicap themselves if they are seeking a mate to support them

Fixed Signals and Contextually Free Signals

Fixed vocal signals are sometimes referred to as "calls" --> presumed to occur in the context of specific social or emotional conditions Alarm calls --> produced in the context of perceived dangers Threat calls --> in the context of a drive to avoid conflict Contact calls --> in the context of visual separation or reestablishment of contact

Grey & White matter

Grey- heavy lifting of cognitive matter neurons that fire, changes tip mid 20's White- bulk of brain/ connections between neurons Studied with MRI Teenagers who engaged in high risk activities had evidence of more mature brains than their conservative peers -grey matter: contains numerous cell bodies and relatively few myelinated axons -white matter: composed chiefly of long-range myelinated axon tracts and contains relatively very few cell bodies

The vast majority of brain development occurs in two basic stages

Growth spurts and pruning In utero and throughout the first several months of life, the human brain grows at a rapid and dramatic pace, producing millions of brain cells. "This is a process that we knew happened in the womb, maybe even in the first 18 months of life This second wave -- occurring roughly between ages 10 and 13 -- is quickly followed by a process in which the brain prunes and organizes its neural pathways. "In many ways, it's the most tumultuous time of brain development since coming out of the womb," says Giedd "Use it or lose it" Most teens get about seven and a half hours of sleep each night, while they need more than nine. Some say these sleep debts can have a powerful effect on a teen's ability to learn and retain new material -- especially abstract concepts like physics, math, and calculus Most beneficial thing for teenagers is good relationships with their parents it's the relationships, it's the connections, it's the people in children's lives who make the biggest difference

Prolactin Hormone

Hormone correlated with milk product in mothers -In a study done by Alan Dixson, male marmosets carrying babies had higher levels of prolactin than males not exposed to babies -Higher prolactin levels found in many species -Cortisol hormone also rises in men cohabiting with pregnant women Found in any allomother defending or nurturing immature mammals Levels rise in males cohabitating with pregnant women

Human Differences

Human infants fully engage in eye-to-eye contact with people who put their faces within the range that they can see Mothers don't have hair on their bodies, therefore, have to physically pick up infant, position him on her breast and hold him there Infants imitate the faces presented to them Eventually learn how to talk and go through "babbling stage" Have en face socializing -Gaze deeply into mother/caretakers eyes (like lover in an early stage relationship)

Persistence

Humans are good at cooperating, they can coordinate complex activities that allow us to exploit resources so effectively Homo ergaster- ancestors could cooperate and share, thus mothers could afford to bear slow- maturing children (homo sapiens) Compassion: "taking an interest in all the details of other poole's existences and understanding their fears and motives, their longings and griefs, and vanities" Separation from the mother meant death by predation, so that any ape that survived to reproduce must have managed to stay attached "Juvenile thieves": the youngsters, insecurely attached children 62% of U.S mothers with kids under age 6 are currently working outside the home and that majority working outside the home and that majority of these mothers are back at work within 3 to 5 months of giving birth The reason our species managed to survive and proliferate to the tune of this plant's 6 billion current occupants has more to do with how readily we learn to cooperate than with what good conquerors we are Natural selection cannot operate on a genetic potential, only on traits that are expressed in the course of development Concerns about stigmatization or what might be seen as "developmental profiling" as well as concerns about the pressure of loving your child unconditionally

Research on Unwanted Children

Hypothesis: unwanted children are at a greater risk to perform behaviors that our society sees a deviant. Difficult to evaluate casual relationships when there are many factors involved Fact: nothing is actual known about childcare What was it about the mother? -Actually her or her unwillingness to bear the child? What has to do with the criminal records? -What bout the children that did not get caught? -Did some mothers become more committed? Who else helped raise the child? -Allomothers Professor Zdenek Dytrych Experiment & Bowlby's Conclusion: unwanted children have a strong correlation with sociopathic tendencies -Bowlby's prediction about cases with heavy maternal deprivation was shown to be correct by the supporting evidence in the experiment

ADHD/ADD

Inappropriate impulsiveness, attention problems, and sometimes, hyperactivity -symptoms include difficulty sustaining attention, laying quietly, listening, and excessive talking and fidgeting -Social impairment -Structural abnormalities in brain circuit whose function is to inhibit thoughts and actions *Prefrontal cortex: planning, decision making, attentional control, and inhibition of inappropriate behavior * Bassal ganglia: involved in generating movements One prerequisite of the ability to sustain attention is that parts of the frontal lobes have reached a certain level of maturity It's unknown to what extent enviro. in put is facilitating or delaying the development of "self-control" Influenced by role models

Working Memory

Individual differences in fluid intelligence are determined by individual differences in attentional control, speed of processing, working-memory resources, and the ability to draw inferences from the information patterns represented in working memory Important brain regions for working memory: -Dorsolateral prefrontal regions -Anterior cingulate(more voluminous in women) -Attentional regions of the prefrontal cortex Occurs as conscious awarness

Injury or Pathology to Broca's Area

Individual wo have pathology or injury to Broca's area generally have difficulty articulating words People w/ damage to this area sometimes have problems understanding language A study found that aspects of word identity, grammar, and pronunciation are all computed with in Broca's area

Infants

Individuals in many specie s find babies at least interesting and even irresistible All primates Thresholds for responding to infants have fallen lower over time

IQ and Fluid Intelligence

Individuals who are high in fluid intelligence learn evolutionarily novel information more easily than do other individuals Fluid intelligence is the best single predictor of occupational performance across the broad swath of jobs Individuals with higher IQ scores populate higher status occupations in the modern work force Cognitive research has shown that it is easier and quicker for intelligent individuals to identify and understand ecological and social information It is quicker and more accurate for the perceptual systems of intelligent people to process this information, and it uses short term memory High measure of gF are linked with "activation of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex" as well as several other attentional control related brain regions such as the "anterior cingulate and regions of the parietal cortex" Larger brain size, and a greater volume of white matter are associated with synchronization (attention-driven) of "the activity of dorsolateral prefrontal cortex" and other areas of the brain that help working-memory representations Cognitive and Brain systems are able to deal with "novelty in social and ecological conditions" because of how they function IQ testing is the best way to predict individual achievement Higher IQs are generally in the higher status occupation of the work force Fluid intelligence is the best at pretending work performance in the broad range of jobs Learning evolutionary novel information is easier for people with a lot of fluid intelligence than for people lacking in it 36-64% of individual differences in academic achievement tests can be explained by differences in general intelligence

Broca's Aphasia

Individuals with damage to this area cannot recall words to communicate and their speech appears broken and jumbled

Allomaternal Care & Assistance

Occurs among village, urban, and foraging people as well as kong animals Also known as cooperative caregiving -Used as a way to rear large litters, offspring that are especially large, or infants that are large but slow maturing (as in humans) Social customs and Propaganda used to INCREASE AVAILABILITY of allomaternal assistance Folk mythology has spread over large parts of South America encompassing people belonging to 6 different language groups -folktale is that teach fetus must be built from installments of semen form all men with whom the woman had sexual intercourse in the 10months before the child's birth -this biological fiction is called Partible Paternity Though not possible, Partible Paternity proves useful in assistance reassurance from a Provider (such as a father) for providing for a child in South America Mothers sometimes rely on Partible Paternity to obtain MULTIPLE honorary fathers -Example: in the "Ache", "nomadic forager community, it was found that over half (63%) had multiple providers *each child has multiple fathers for only one mother *more children survived with multiple providers than children with one provider -Example: in the "Bari" a fishing-horticultural community, two fathers were similarly BETTER than one father This appears in societies where provisioning by males is unpredictable, such as fishing and hunting, father have a high probability of dying or defecting This also appears in populations where the men to women ratio is extremely high such as in small clawed monkeys

Cooperative Breeding

Involved assigning roles to community members Members must be ready to switch roles when called upon Example: a female must be ready to go from being a caretaker to being a mother Allomothers sometimes undergo pseudopregnancies and will begin to lactate and can provide milk for the young like the mother would If allomother in a cooperative breeding situation tried to haver her own child, it is possible that the alpha female would attempt to eat her offspring Characterized by: -unusually flexible and optimistic breeding systems -adaptations that help increase the availability of allomothers Variables: -Availability and responsiveness of the mother -Presence or absence of the father -Whether or not baby was in day care or mother care Advantages: -Allows mothers to have more offspring then they would normally be able to keep alive -Take advantage of resources like coordinated hunting -Allows animals to move into and dominate new habitats that normally would not be available Examples: -Florida Scrub Jay, Bees, Wasps, Termites Result (NCIHD) : -Critical variable was not the presence of the mother but in how secure the infant felt when cared for by familiar people Children with less responsive mothers are at risk for being noncompliant, aggressive, and doing less well in day care and later in school Infants need to feel secured, and they need familiar people that are sensitive and responsive to infants need Permits mothers to produce especially costly young or to rear more offspring than otherwise would survive (wild jackets, bees, termites, wasps) Allows animals to take advantage of processes and resources as well as allowing them to move into and even dominate new habitats that otherwise would not be available (florida scrub jay)

Nurturing/ Adoption

It is been found to be more difficult eliciting nurturing responses from a pre-productive male or female compared to a mother figure It is not impossible to overcome this This seems to be one of the biggest reasons why animals of primatology abound to adoptions, or find abandoned babies to help and raise

Comparing literate and illiterate people

Literate people can more easily break up words by sounds with thinking about letters using phonemes. Sounds = letters -Brainwashing through literacy is real *Once you know alphabet, whole perception of speech changes -Illiterate struggled with repeating made-up words versus literate -When tested with made up words results showed: *Literate- use more left temporal lobe (specific language processing) *Illiterate- use more frontal lobe(retrieval of memories) *Speech sound is key in reading *Silent reading and reading aloud shows similar brain activity

Prefrontal Cortex

Located in the anterior part of the frontal lobe This part of the brain is responsible for executive function - rational decision making The white matter in this area is the last to mare; a process that does not complete until the early-to-mid twenties Phineas Gage- both frontal lobes destroyed *personality change but had same skills Controls ability to delay immediate gratification. Significant for adolescents as they mature through a pard of physical and emotional transitions with exposure to social situations that result in risk taking

Male Marmosets

Male marmosets (monkeys) have been known to be attracted to and carry babies since the 18th century Marmoset mothers tend to be polyandrous when it comes to mating Baby marmosets are better reared when the mate is in the cage with their mother

Autism

Mind Blindness Theory: the intuitive ability to understand that other people have minds -Missing in Autism patients Pretence: involves understanding that belief is different form reality and depends on having a they of mind Problem in children: -Lock of joint attention -Lack of pretend play (normally around 18months, autistic about 5 yrs later than normal) Lacking the innate basis for mind reading does not recluse the ability to learn about mental seas Inhibition: function of frontal lobes; inhibitory control that stops us from saying/ doing exactly as we feel, depending on social context

Synesthesia

Mix of different sensations The automatic integration of sound and sight in seen in a condition called synesthesia -Most people with synesthia associate every letter with a particular color -No one knows what causes this but synesthesia is a phenomenon that tells us how our experience of written language -In english and french it is more important to recognize whole word forms than to translate letters to sounds -Mixes colors and words -People who have "condition" have no brain abnormality -No one knows for sure cause *The combination of senses is a consequence of childhood associations *Overactive connections between area of brain that processes colors and the word form area - (4-5%) of population may have some kind of synesthetic experience

Breeding Societies

Monogamous/Polygamously -one male, several females Polyandrous -one female, several males We can conclude that no matter what type of society, our ancestors evolved as cooperative breeders Polyandrous relationships are present in many cultures around the world In the US we tend to see monogamy as a relatively permanent relationship In other cultures polygamous relationships start out as monogamous and many polygamous relationships are also viewed as temporary Polyandrous relationships support the idea that "it takes a village" -When a child has multiple parents its like the child as different and significantly more adult influences in their life -Then a child of a monogamous relationship would only have 2 adult influences *and subsequently less varied influential views on the world

Day Care

NICHD- study of child care Is day care better than mother care? -Yes, the study showed that in case where the mother is abusive or neglectful day care is better -Excluding those cases there was no real way to actually come to a conclusion Day care is expensive unless you have family members to help you out Day care workers get paid less than min wage (receive low income and high turnover rate of 30%) Study found no ill effects from rampant day care, even day care of infants NICHD study showed: Day care was better than mother care when the mother was neglectful or abusive(care was of a high quality, meaning plenty of staff, the same caretakers all the time, like committed kin.) Mothers are variable themselves- their circumstances, and their levels of commitment

Primability of Caretakers

Neural and endocrine systems have to be activated and in place in order for nurturing and cooperative care taking to happen The thresholds for response have fallen lower causing allomothers (an animal tat takes care of the young born by another), to emote sensitive to the signals babies emit

Inferior (lower) Parietal Lobe

Used in comparing numbers, subtraction, multiplication, and addition

Acquired Dyslexia

Used to describe reading problems that arise after brain damage in a previously perfectly normal reader

Left and Right Brain

One Side is stronger than the other, but both sides work together in most situations Examples: -People with no right hemisphere are not without any creativity -People with no left hemisphere still are able to be analytical with no language formation Right Hemisphere: -unable to identify written numerals -cannot name digits alone and perform arithmetic -can approximate Left Hemisphere: -can add but split brain patients find this impossible if the sums are shown to their right hemisphere -can do multiplication -calculates Both sides of brain work together in almost all situations, tasks, and processes -education currently favors left brain modes Left brain: -logical, analytical, dominant, and accurate Right Brain: -creative, intuitive, emotional, and subjective

Adolescent Romantic Relationships

Oxytocin appears to be involved with pair bonding "Adrenarche" is the elevation in production of pubertal hormones Adolescent dating provides a mechanism for advancing in dominance status Having a desirable mate can enhance an individuals stays "secure relationships with parents are linked to stable intimate romantic relationships"

Dyscalculia

Parietal lobe lesions caused by stroke or brain damage can lead to dyscalculia Numeracy fails to develop Example: Can't estimate if 26 or 31 is larger -Can be neurological or can be due to outside stimulus such as anxiety -Ability to acquire math skills is moderately to severely impaired -Difficulty counting, calculating, or working out how long activities will take -"Different Language" to these people -Can occur in children with dyslexia, don't know why though -Can occur in very bright children and be very frustrating to them and make them lose motivation

Learning and Brain Mechanisms

People with higher general intelligence can complete a task faster but the use more glucose/ brain power to do so The more times a task is done, the less energy the brain uses to continue learning the taks

Development of Dominance

Physical traits appear to be criteria of mate choice and leadership in most cultures but especially in the US Chinese adolescents typical place more emphasis on faithful friendship than popularity In general, individuals who perceive malice against them where no malice actually exists tend to be low ranking

Evolution and Development

Prepubertal children compete for material resources and social opportunities that contribute to their fitness Childhood ranks tend to carry over into adolescence Stability of US boys suggests that criteria of dominance remain similar through development

Primate Differences

Primates are interested in their mothers faces, BUT only take a brief look now and then Mothers have hair on their bodies, therefore, her infant can grab on and hang there for as long as he need to. Do not continuously "babble" or talk like humans

Module

Principal start up mechanism for fast learning of quantity and number is missing *Some children suffer from early deficit of the parietal lobe which is involved in visuospatial processing and is associated with knowledge of quantities and their relations *And/or connections between quantity and exact number concepts may fail to develop properly -Being able to read and write is an artificially taught skill -Writing started in sumer part of Mesopotamia, and independently in China about 5000 years ago -Before writing,spoken language existed for tens of thousands of hers -Speech depends on memory and remains a transient mode of communication -Written language does not convey the melody or prosody of spoken sentences -Language have developed writing systems that primarily ma visible signs onto sounds of speech May fail to develop properly because of early brain damage or genetic disorganization of the underlying neural circuitry

Mechanisms

Repeated "practice" of tasks such as reading can result in more automated brain processing with learned association between different regions of the brain. Over time this learned association becomes implicit knowledge -This process leads to evolutionary novel cognitive competency

Autism and Brain Parts

Social Brain: active when norm adults engage in automatic mentalizing 3 regions activated when inferring people's intentions, beliefs, and desires: 1) medial prefrontal cortex: monitoring internal mental states of self and others 2) superior temporal sulcus: recognizing and analyzing people's movements and actions 3) temporal pole: processing emotions -The trouble spots in autistic patients are in the temporal and frontal lobes, and cerebellum -Children with autism have larger brains because appropriate synaptic pruning doesn't occur

Three Domains of Mind

Social- behavior, competing for mates Biological- other species of food and medicine Physical- territory with biological or reproductive resources Behavior: Enables individuals to gain access to resources that support survival -Social domain: behavior of resources -Biological domain: other species that can be used as food -Physical domain: territory that contains biological or reproductive resources

Aggressiveness and Rank

Subordinate individuals often assume a position away from the center of the group -this portion is less desirable and more dangerous Subordinates that remain in the group are often victims of aggression by others with higher rank -Known as "peck right" The Alpha individual is generally not aggressive (others know alpha wins)

Limbic System

The amygdala is included in the LIMBIC system. This system is strongly associated with emotions and motivations -emotions such as fear, anger and pleasure are associated with the amygdala The amygdala is associated with emotions and drives related to survival

Developmental Period

The long developmental period in humans results from complexity and variability in social relationships and biological and physical- ecological niches occupied by humans

Violence

The rise in violence during adolescence may be due to onset of sexual competence Most homicides involves males competing to uphold their reputation, secure resources or to punish a lover Females also face sexual competition Females are under greater time pressure "mate value" declines after adolescence Assault violence peaks in early reproductive years

Heritable capacities and development, nature and nurture, are both involved:

There is each individual's emotional, empathetic component, which studies show is to some degree heritable Learned component- analytical skills than emotion, as each individual learns to look at the world from someone else's perspective -people need occasions to develop their capacities for empathy survive -traits never expressed are lost -human are shaped by a long heritage of cooperative breeding