Book contents
- The Cambridge Handbook of Forensic Psychology
- The Cambridge Handbook of Forensic Psychology
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Forensic psychology:
- Part I Psychological underpinnings
- 1.1 Action system applied to forensic topics
- 1.2 Child and adolescent offending
- 1.3 Developmental perspectives on offending
- 1.4 The evolutionary psychology perspective
- 1.5 Eyewitness memory
- 1.6 Facet meta-theory
- 1.7 Head injury and offending
- 1.8 Investigative decision making
- 1.9 Investigative psychology
- 1.10 Personality theories and offending
- 1.11 Pragmatic psychology
- 1.12 Sexual offenders
- 1.13 Social psychological theories applied to forensic psychology topics
- 1.14 Theories of change
- 1.15 Therapeutic jurisprudence
- 1.16 Violent offending
- Part II Assessments
- Part III Interventions
- Part IV Psychology and criminal behaviour
- Part V Psychology and civil law
- Part VI Special topics
- Part VII Professional practice
- Part VIII Research practice
- Author index
- Subject index
1.4 - The evolutionary psychology perspective
from Part I - Psychological underpinnings
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 July 2010
Book contents
- The Cambridge Handbook of Forensic Psychology
- The Cambridge Handbook of Forensic Psychology
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Forensic psychology:
- Part I Psychological underpinnings
- 1.1 Action system applied to forensic topics
- 1.2 Child and adolescent offending
- 1.3 Developmental perspectives on offending
- 1.4 The evolutionary psychology perspective
- 1.5 Eyewitness memory
- 1.6 Facet meta-theory
- 1.7 Head injury and offending
- 1.8 Investigative decision making
- 1.9 Investigative psychology
- 1.10 Personality theories and offending
- 1.11 Pragmatic psychology
- 1.12 Sexual offenders
- 1.13 Social psychological theories applied to forensic psychology topics
- 1.14 Theories of change
- 1.15 Therapeutic jurisprudence
- 1.16 Violent offending
- Part II Assessments
- Part III Interventions
- Part IV Psychology and criminal behaviour
- Part V Psychology and civil law
- Part VI Special topics
- Part VII Professional practice
- Part VIII Research practice
- Author index
- Subject index
Summary
Evolutionary psychology adopts a Darwinian approach to understanding the causes of behaviour. Darwinian psychology deals with the ultimate causes of heritable adaptations. In recent years, evolutionary psychology has either become obsolete or greatly expanded its scope and explanatory power, depending on one's point of view. One of evolutionary psychology's most important goals is to create theories of behaviour and the mind that are consilient with the more basic life sciences, namely evolutionary biology and the new science of development. There have been some important applications of evolutionary psychology to forensic psychology. Darwinian theory is uniquely applicable to conflicts of interest among individuals because it is the only theory that can provide an explanation of why individuals have perceptions of self-interest at all and why there are lawful variations in these perceptions. Evolutionary psychology has also made important contributions in the area of sexual coercion.
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- The Cambridge Handbook of Forensic Psychology , pp. 43 - 48Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010