Spatial adaptations for plant foraging: women excel and calories count
Spatial adaptations for plant foraging: women excel and calories count
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DOI：
10.1098/rspb.2007.0826
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发表时间：
2007-11-07
影响因子：
4.7
通讯作者：
Gaulin, Steven J. C.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
New, Joshua;Krasnow, Max M.;Gaulin, Steven J. C.
我们提出了进化的性别二态适应的证据，这种适应激活了空间记忆和导航技能，以回应水果、蔬菜和其他传统上可采集的固着食物资源。尽管有大量证据表明男性在各种各样的导航任务中具有优势，但我们证明，内容上的简单但具有生态意义的转变可以扭转这种性别差异。这一效应是由祖先觅食劳动中的性别分化选择用于采集特定空间机制的理论预测的，并与这一理论一致，其中一些机制是性别分化的。我们的发现进一步支持了人类大脑中存在聚集特有的空间适应的假设，即空间记忆优先用于营养质量较高的资源(如卡路里密度)。这一结果有力地表明，潜在的机制在一定程度上是为了适应高效的觅食而进化的。综上所述，这些结果表明，人类的空间认知是内容敏感、领域特定的，是自然选择设计的，以符合祖先世界的重要规律。
We present evidence for an evolved sexually dimorphic adaptation that activates spatial memory and navigation skills in response to fruits, vegetables and other traditionally gatherable sessile food resources. In spite of extensive evidence for a male advantage on a wide variety of navigational tasks, we demonstrate that a simple but ecologically important shift in content can reverse this sex difference. This effect is predicted by and consistent with the theory that a sexual division in ancestral foraging labour selected for gathering-specific spatial mechanisms, some of which are sexually differentiated. The hypothesis that gathering-specific spatial adaptations exist in the human mind is further supported by our finding that spatial memory is preferentially engaged for resources with higher nutritional quality ( e. g. caloric density). This result strongly suggests that the underlying mechanisms evolved in part as adaptations for efficient foraging. Together, these results demonstrate that human spatial cognition is content sensitive, domain specific and designed by natural selection to mesh with important regularities of the ancestral world.