Rethinking evolutionary psychology

In Rethinking Evolutionary Psychology, Andrew Goldfinch dramatically reframes the way we think about evolutionary psychology. Rather than follow the standard way of thinking about evolutionary psychology as a paradigm and a pretender metatheory of the evolutionary behavioural sciences, Goldfinch argues that evolutionary psychology is better thought of as a heuristic research programme within the evolutionary behavioural sciences. Elucidating evolutionary psychology as a heuristic illuminates those aspects of adaptationist methodology in psychology that deserve serious attention. It reveals evolutionary psychology to be a unique set of concepts, research strategies and recipes for generating new and bold discoveries in psychology; a searchlight that can identify and chart plausible and unexplored research trajectories; a constrained yet creative way to win new facts that would otherwise be lost to the infinite space of random trial and error.

Introduction -- 1. Evolutionary Psychology As A Paradigm -- 1.0. Introduction -- 1.1. Evolutionary Theory, With An Emphasis On Natural Selection And Adaptation -- 1.2. The Possibility Of Psychological Adaptations -- 1.3. Empirical Adaptationism -- 1.4. Inference From Empirical Adaptationism To Massive Modularity -- 1.5. Methodological Adaptationism -- 1.6. Metatheory For Psychology And The Behavioural Sciences -- 1.7. Public Policy Agenda -- 1.8. Conclusion -- 2. Subverting The Paradigm -- 2.0. Introduction -- 2.1. Levels Of Selection -- 2.2. Environment Of Evolutionary Adaptedness -- 2.3. Behavioural Flexibility -- 2.4. Developmental Complexity and Robustness -- 2.5. Psychological Adaptations As Modules -- 2.6. The Failure To Infer Massive Modularity From Empirical Adaptationism -- 2.7. Methodological Objections -- 2.8. Metatheory Or Marketing? -- 2.9. Policy And Popularisation Dangers -- 2.10. Conclusion -- 3. Evolutionary Psychology And Heuristics -- 3.0. Introduction -- 3.1. Heuristics In Science -- 3.2. Heuristics In Evolutionary Psychology -- 3.3. The Two Research Strategies In Tandem -- 3.4. Heuristics For Identifying Adaptive Problems -- 3.5. Heuristics For Identifying Ada…