Reflecting upon the many different classes I have taken in my lifetime, I definitely feel that evolution has interacted with a good chunk of them. I remember learning about evolution in middle school and high school and that information has proven to be useful in many classes I’ve taken in college. My major at MSU is psychology and I can think of at least two psychology classes that I have taken that have mentioned Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution. The article that talks about the genetic similarity between humans and chimpanzees really jumped out at me because it connects very directly to psychology. Many contributions have come from studies and research experiments studying chimpanzees. Psychologists are able to use the data from studies on how chimpanzees work to conclude questions related to how humans work. All of this research would not be possible without Darwin’s contributions surrounding evolution.
There is an entire field of psychology called Evolutionary Psychology that focuses on how evolution contributes to the ways we study human behavior. According to evolutionary psychologists, human behavior evolves in the same way that physical characteristics evolve. There are specific patterns of behavior that make an individual more likely to survive and reproduce and pass on this behavior. These ideas contribute immensely to our understanding on how humans work and they help us better understand human behavior.
Even thinking about classes outside of my psych major, I can think of numerous times where my background knowledge on evolution contributed to my understanding of the material in the class. I took a regular statistics course last year and they used many different examples that had to do with antibiotic resistance. We had to use our knowledge of how bacteria are able to build up resistance to antibiotics through evolution/natural selection in order to understand how we can use this data to calculate information statistically.
I don’t think that I have ever really considered the major ways that evolution has interacted with my psychology classes until reading these articles. To me, evolution was something so ingrained in my mind that I never thought twice about using that information in other classes or even outside of school. I sometimes even forget that natural selection is still a topic of debate for many people because I feel that it’s so relevant to all aspects of life and I feel that there is too much evidence that supports the idea that living things follow the patterns of evolution/natural selection.
I think that acknowledging how crucial evolution is to understanding my major gives me a new respect for evolution and my high school AP Biology class. I would learn about evolution while not fully understanding the magnitude of the information that I was being given. I can now better appreciate evolution for its contributions to the field that I love and to all of the other aspects of life that evolution is a part of. I will now be able to pay much more attention to the different ways that I come into contact with Charles Darwin’s ideas in future psychology classes that I take.
Hi Julia!
With you being a psychology major, I’m sure you have talked about and reviewed studies of evolution quite a few times. I know from previous psychology classes I’ve taken that Charles Darwin is almost always mentioned as you said. I really liked how you brought in your statistics class from last year. I find it extremely interesting that your field, psychology, could be connected with a field seen as completely unalike, statistics. Off the top of my head, I would never really assume you could use the knowledge gained from psychology studies to a mathematical field. I agree with you in that I don’t always remember natural selection is still up for debate. I think there is substantial evidence that proves evolution and natural selection exist and as with you, it’s ingrained in me. I really enjoyed reading your post and loved the connections you made!
Hi, Julia! I am a Human Biology major and so, I have only taken one psychology course at MSU so far. Although, I do remember learning about Charles Darwin during that course. I did not know that Evolutionary Psychology is a whole different field of Psychology. So glad you mentioned that! I agree that I never really considered major ways in how my Human Biology courses have interacted with evolution. Although, when I look at the bigger picture, it all ties back to human evolution and variability. Also, I agree that evolution is way more important than we consider it to be. Most classes just mention it then brush it aside, but not many emphasize its importance. I like how you not only talked about classes within your major but other courses and high school courses! Overall, your post was very honest and engaging. Thanks for sharing!
Hello Julia! Thank you for sharing some insight into the field of psychology and what you have learned as a psychology major. I agree with you perspective that humans would probably not study primates in the same way they do, had it not been for Charles Darwin and many scientists who followed him in researching evolutionary biology. It is very hard for many people to come to grips with the fact that we are so closely related to the other animals, but once we begin to see how similar we really are we can begin to understand ourselves through them. I was also interested in hearing about the evolutionary psychology subfield of psychology. The first thing that came to mind for me is the evolution of how people use social media, whether it is to gain fame, friends, or just to look at memes, we all have different reasons for our use of social media and I think it would be very interesting to understand the biocultural evolution happening on a psychological level here.
My evolution education started in middle school as well when we started learning about where the first human evolved, I think it was important for us to start learning this early on because it really did get me thinking. Psychology was going to be my major but after the first class I quickly switched but I do remember getting to the Charles Darwin theory of evolution and i found it very peeking to my interest. The thought that behaviors evolve like physical traits is a new one for me, but when you connect it to survival it makes since. I agree evolution and natural selection is very relevant and i honestly don’t see how people could question it or say that its not true with all the facts behind it