ABSTRACT
Social psychology represents the sub-discipline most likely to benefit from evolutionary theorizing because many areas of research in social psychology are closely linked to evolutionarily important problems. Yet social psychologists on both the left and the right of the political spectrum sometimes find evolutionary explanations for social behavior to be offensive, albeit for different reasons. We surveyed members (N = 335) of the Society for Experimental Social Psychology (SESP) to examine the degree to which political ideology was linked with attitudes toward evolutionary explanations for social psychological phenomena. Although nearly all SESP members accept evolutionary theory, there was substantial disagreement about whether evolutionary approaches could help explain social attitudes and preferences. Some of this disagreement seems to be rooted in political ideology, as only psychologists on the left of the political spectrum were likely to strongly reject several important evolutionary hypotheses. We discuss reasons for social psychologists’ reactions to evolutionary theorizing and findings, including fundamental confusions about the logic of evolutionary psychological hypotheses and fears about the misuse of scientific findings. We end by concluding that social psychology and evolutionary psychology are natural allies and have much to gain scientifically by their integration.
