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Parallel evolution—where different populations evolve similar traits in response to similar environments—has been a topic of growing interest to biologists and biological anthropologists for decades. Parallel evolution occurs in human populations thanks to myriad biological and cultural mechanisms that permit humans to survive and thrive in diverse environments worldwide. Because humans shape and are shaped by their environments, biocultural approaches that emphasize the interconnections between biology and culture are key to understanding parallel evolution in human populations as well as the nuances of human biological variation and adaptation. In this review, we discuss how biocultural theory has been and can be applied to studies of parallel evolution and adaptation more broadly. We illustrate this through four examples of parallel evolution in humans: malaria resistance, lactase persistence, cold tolerance, and high‐altitude adaptation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The last two years have seen the publication of two books in the genre of how-to fiction writing manuals that use science both as a selling point and as a genuine analytical paradigm. The Science of Storytelling by Will Storr and The Science of Screenwriting by Paul Joseph Gulino and Connie Shears use insights from the cognitive sciences and evolutionary psychology, while retaining their practical, how-to character. This review article goes through some of the main clusters of advice shared by the two books, dealing with information processing, attention allocation, the implications of human sociality for fiction, and story structure, while fitting their takes on these issues within the fields of biocultural criticism and cultural evolution. Despite containing occasional flaws and confusions about theory common in pioneering works, these books could be harbingers of change for the genre and an important step in the bottom-up infusion of biocultural theory into literary studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evolutionary or biocultural theorizing about horror films has been slow to gain traction in film studies, but the field has seen two recent book publications, Mastering Fear by Rikke Schubart and Primal Roots of Horror Cinema by Carrol L. Fry. Unfortunately, neither book is poised to make a substantial impact on evolutionary horror film theory. Mastering Fear ultimately undermines its own engagement with evolutionary social science, and Primal Roots of Horror Cinema stops short of contributing substantially to the field beyond its compelling argument for the relevance of evolutionary social science to film studies. Plenty of work remains to be done at the fertile junction between evolutionary psychology and horror film. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article applies a life history model to advance the evolutionary understanding of poetry that inspired nineteenth-century Swedish National Romanticism. We show that the characters featured in two of Erik Gustaf Geijer's poems, "The Viking" and "The Yeoman Farmer" (1811), display patterns of time perspective, mating effort, and parental investment that are now recognized as central life history attributes: a fast strategy and a slow strategy, respectively. These patterns were identified by undergraduate participants (N = 427) who read excerpts of the poems that had been stripped of identifying information and mentions of romantic or sexual relationships. Participants read each poem and rated each character on validated scales of the life history dimensions of mating effort and parental investment, relationship interests and attractiveness, characteristics of his developmental environment, and physiological characteristics. Results are consistent with generally accepted associations in life history theory and also inform current theoretical developments and debates. Geijer had an intuitive understanding of life history patterns, which he used to create recognizable characters for his Romantic depiction of Swedish history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How far has the Darwinian revolution come? To what extent have evolutionary ideas penetrated into the social sciences and humanities? Are the “science wars” over? Or do whole blocs of disciplines face off over an unbridgeable epistemic gap? To answer questions like these, contributors to top journals in 22 disciplines were surveyed on their beliefs about human nature, culture, and science. More than 600 respondents completed the survey. Scoring patterns divided into two main sets of disciplines. Genetic influences were emphasized in the evolutionary social sciences, evolutionary humanities, psychology, empirical study of the arts, philosophy, economics, and political science. Environmental influences were emphasized in most of the humanities disciplines and in anthropology, sociology, education, and women’s or gender studies. Confidence in scientific explanation correlated positively with emphasizing genetic influences on behavior, and negatively with emphasizing environmental influences. Knowing the current actual landscape of belief should help scholars avoid sterile debates and ease the way toward fruitful collaborations with neighboring disciplines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay sketches out a biocultural theory of religion which is based on an expanded view of cognition that is anchored in brain and body (embrained and embodied), deeply dependent on culture (enculturated) and extended and distributed beyond the borders of individual brains. Such an approach uniquely accommodates contemporary cultural and neurobiological sciences. Since the challenge that the study of religion faces, in my opinion, is at the interstices of these sciences, I have tried to develop a theory of religion which acknowledges the fact. My hope is that the theory can be of use to scholars of religion and be submitted to further hypotheses and tests by cognitive scientists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]