Sex differences in behavioral and hormonal response to social threat: Commentary on Taylor et al.
Geary and Flinn's commentary accepts the tend-and-befriend proposal and argues that it was drawn too narrowly. Their case is that the evolutionary frame needs to include features of human social life that the original paper set aside. Human fathers invest heavily in their children compared with most mammals, so tending should be expected from men too in some stressful situations, and is observed. Women's befriending, they argue, looks like an elaboration of reciprocal altruism rather than a distinct female system. Men befriend as well, but in the service of coalitions, so male alliance-building belongs inside the fight-or-flight response rather than outside it. And if men's investment in children is valuable, then competition between women over access to it should be expected. The effect of the commentary is to keep the observation while dissolving the neat division between a male response and a female one. This vault cites the pair together, since the disagreement between them is the useful part.
Geary and Flinn's commentary accepts the tend-and-befriend proposal and argues that it was drawn too narrowly. Their case is that the evolutionary frame needs to include features of human social life that the original paper set aside. Human fathers invest heavily in their children compared with most mammals, so tending should be expected from men too in some stressful situations, and is observed. Women's befriending, they argue, looks like an elaboration of reciprocal altruism rather than a distinct female system. Men befriend as well, but in the service of coalitions, so male alliance-building belongs inside the fight-or-flight response rather than outside it. And if men's investment in children is valuable, then competition between women over access to it should be expected. The effect of the commentary is to keep the observation while dissolving the neat division between a male response and a female one. This vault cites the pair together, since the disagreement between them is the useful part.
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Reproduced as it was written when this source was checked, figures and all.
(2000).” Psychological Review, 109(4), 745-750.
Where we use it
- Cliques Are a Stress Response, Why We Belong
Reliability of this reference
The link below was matched against the publisher's record on title, first author and year, and all three agree.
The source
https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295x.109.4.745
DOI: 10.1037/0033-295x.109.4.745