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→Childhood bullies experience greater sexual success than non-bullies
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<span style="font-size:125%">'''Discussion:'''</span> | <span style="font-size:125%">'''Discussion:'''</span> | ||
Bullying likely makes men more directly attractive to women for a variety of reasons. Despite frequent claims that bullies are primarily motivated by low-self esteem and unstable home environments, exclusive bullying victims generally have lower self-esteem vs. those who are both perpetrators and victims of bullying in boys (Pollastri et al., 2009). Thus, bullying may be an effective tactic that lowers one's sexual rivals' social status and boost one's status, likely explaining (at least partially) why bullies are more attractive to women. | Bullying likely makes men more directly attractive to women for a variety of reasons. Despite frequent claims that bullies are primarily motivated by low-self esteem and unstable home environments, exclusive bullying victims generally have lower self-esteem vs. those who are both perpetrators and victims of bullying in boys (Pollastri et al., 2009). Thus, bullying may be an effective tactic, a form of [[intrasexual competition]] (Lee, 2017; Provenzano et al. 2017), that lowers one's sexual rivals' social status and boost one's status, likely explaining (at least partially) why bullies are more attractive to women. | ||
Such effects are likely to be weakened or obscured by school anti-bullying programs, potentially making engaging in overt bullying behaviors more costly in terms of potential reputational damage that this behavior may incur. The effectiveness of bullying as a socio-sexual tactic also seems to vary wildly by differences in the initial social status and physical attractiveness of the perpetrators/victims, with higher-status individuals likely being socially rewarded more for bullying and excluding lower status individuals. Rosen & Underwood (2010) found some indirect support for this assertion, as the researchers found that overtly aggressive behavior was associated with lower peer popularity for facially unattractive boys. Thus one would expect bullying to be a much more effective tactic for further increasing the mating success of high status and physically attractive individuals, and being a bully may hamper the mating success of less attractive individuals. | Such effects are likely to be weakened or obscured by school anti-bullying programs, potentially making engaging in overt bullying behaviors more costly in terms of potential reputational damage that this behavior may incur. The effectiveness of bullying as a socio-sexual tactic also seems to vary wildly by differences in the initial social status and physical attractiveness of the perpetrators/victims, with higher-status individuals likely being socially rewarded more for bullying and excluding lower status individuals. Rosen & Underwood (2010) found some indirect support for this assertion, as the researchers found that overtly aggressive behavior was associated with lower peer popularity for facially unattractive boys. Thus one would expect bullying to be a much more effective tactic for further increasing the mating success of high status and physically attractive individuals, and being a bully may hamper the mating success of less attractive individuals. | ||
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The tendency to bully others (and even one's likelihood to be a victim of bullying) is also substantially heritable (Huhtamäki et al., 2020), with genetic factors accounting for up to 62% percent of the variance in the tendency to be a perpetrator of bullying behaviors. Thus if a man's tendency towards engaging in bullying was effective in increasing his reproductive fitness, as the literature into the subject has generally demonstrated, it is certainly possible that women have evolved to be attracted to this trait. The women that reproduce with such men will likely have increased reproductive fitness if their sons inherit their father's tendency to be a bully ([[sexy sons hypothesis]]). | The tendency to bully others (and even one's likelihood to be a victim of bullying) is also substantially heritable (Huhtamäki et al., 2020), with genetic factors accounting for up to 62% percent of the variance in the tendency to be a perpetrator of bullying behaviors. Thus if a man's tendency towards engaging in bullying was effective in increasing his reproductive fitness, as the literature into the subject has generally demonstrated, it is certainly possible that women have evolved to be attracted to this trait. The women that reproduce with such men will likely have increased reproductive fitness if their sons inherit their father's tendency to be a bully ([[sexy sons hypothesis]]). | ||
Another explanation for bullying behavior may be the ''social brain hypothesis'' which posits that the competitive cognitive demands of sociality have driven the evolution of enlarged brains in some mammals, especially in primates. | |||
Machiavellianism in particular may serve to assist individuals in negotiating their social world (Turpin, 2021), explaining the general prevalence of Machiavellianism as evidenced by high rates of [[mate poaching]] in the overall population, and Machiavellianism not even being linked to evolutionarily more ancient fast life history strategies, despite being considered a "dark" personality trait (Davis, 2019). However, notably only the calculated and manipulative aspect of Machiavellianism such as lying effectively is actually linked to higher general intelligence (Zhang, 2018), but nonetheless such competition might select for higher specialized/non-general, especially verbal skills which require to be accommodated by more neuronal capacity and larger, complex brains. | |||
Selection for socially complex, Machiavellian behavior would act at multiple levels, from intrasexual to intragroup to intergroup competition, and bullying behavior toward the neurodivergent might be explained by such individuals being particularly easy prey of Machiavellian, socially competitive behavior. | |||
Apart from socially competitive behavior, bullying might also play a role in socially synergistic behavior. In particular, bullying may prevent from individuals straying away from the group's shared goals and values thereby increasing the group's cohesion, and might also ensure a high level of body hygiene thereby increasing the group's parasite resistance. | |||
More speculatively, bullying and avoidance of the [[neurodivergent]] may be an instance of [[wikipedia:Behavioral immune system|behavioral immune system]], i.e. adaptations that lower the risk the of becoming infected by neurotoxic or neuroactive infectious diseases (Curtis, 2011). Parasites alone account for 67% of the worldwide variation in intelligence and the virus ''toxoplasma gondii'' has been suspected to be linked to schizophrenia and lowered IQ (Willyard, 2010, Hunter, 2012). | |||
The general implication of this research is that bullying, at least partially, represents an innate evolutionary adaption. Since this behavior appears highly effective at getting men things they generally desire immensely (women, resources, peer status) efforts to eliminate bullying completely (e.g., 'zero tolerance' policies for bullying) seem quite futile and overly idealistic. Programs that genuinely seek to reduce incidences of bullying will likely need to acknowledge the role of genetics in causing this behavior to begin with and will need to acknowledge (and attempt to counter) the clear evolutionary and social benefits of bullying in order to have any chance of succeeding. | The general implication of this research is that bullying, at least partially, represents an innate evolutionary adaption. Since this behavior appears highly effective at getting men things they generally desire immensely (women, resources, peer status) efforts to eliminate bullying completely (e.g., 'zero tolerance' policies for bullying) seem quite futile and overly idealistic. Programs that genuinely seek to reduce incidences of bullying will likely need to acknowledge the role of genetics in causing this behavior to begin with and will need to acknowledge (and attempt to counter) the clear evolutionary and social benefits of bullying in order to have any chance of succeeding. | ||
<span style="font-size:125%">'''Quotes:'''</span> | <span style="font-size:125%">'''Quotes:'''</span> | ||
* ''Taken together, results from the present study offer mixed, but generally positive, support for our hypothesis that bullying is an evolutionarily adaptive behavior''. | * ''Taken together, results from the present study offer mixed, but generally positive, support for our hypothesis that bullying is an evolutionarily adaptive behavior''. | ||
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*Volk AA, Dane AV, Zopito AM, Vaillancourt T. 2015. ''Adolescent Bullying, Dating, and Mating: Testing an Evolutionary Hypothesis.'' Evolutionary Psychology. [[https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1474704915613909 FullText]] | *Volk AA, Dane AV, Zopito AM, Vaillancourt T. 2015. ''Adolescent Bullying, Dating, and Mating: Testing an Evolutionary Hypothesis.'' Evolutionary Psychology. [[https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1474704915613909 FullText]] | ||
*Provenzano DA, Dane AV, Farrell AH, Marini Z, Volk AA. 2017. ''Do Bullies Have More Sex? The Role of Personality''. Evolutionary Psychological Science. [[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321812090_Do_Bullies_Have_More_Sex_The_Role_of_Personality FullText]] | *Provenzano DA, Dane AV, Farrell AH, Marini Z, Volk AA. 2017. ''Do Bullies Have More Sex? The Role of Personality''. Evolutionary Psychological Science. [[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321812090_Do_Bullies_Have_More_Sex_The_Role_of_Personality FullText]] | ||
* Lee, K. (2017). ''Adolescent Bullying and Intrasexual Competition: Body Concerns and Self-Promotion Tactics amongst Bullies, Victims and Bully-Victims'' (Doctoral dissertation, University of Warwick). [[http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/90332/ FullText]] | |||
* Turpin, M. H., Kara-Yakoubian, M., Walker, A. C., Walker, H. E., Fugelsang, J. A., & Stolz, J. A. (2021). ''Bullshit Ability as an Honest Signal of Intelligence.'' Evolutionary Psychology, 19(2), 14747049211000317. [[https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/14747049211000317 FullText]] | |||
* Davis, A. C., Visser, B. A., Volk, A. A., Vaillancourt, T., & Arnocky, S. (2019). ''The relations between life history strategy and dark personality traits among young adults.'' Evolutionary Psychological Science, 5(2), 166-177. [[https://evolutionlab.nipissingu.ca/wp-content/uploads/sites/68/2019/09/Davis2019_Article_TheRelationsBetweenLifeHistory.pdf FullText]] | |||
* Zhang, I. Y., & Goffin PhD, R. D. (2018). ''Evil Geniuses at Work: Does Intelligence Interact with the Dark Triad to Predict Workplace Deviance?'' [[https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1042&context=psychd_uht FullText]] | |||
* Curtis, V., De Barra, M., & Aunger, R. (2011). ''Disgust as an adaptive system for disease avoidance behaviour.'' Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 366(1563), 389-401. [[https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rstb.2010.0117 FullText]] | |||
* Hunter, P. (2012). ''What doesn’t kill you makes you dumber.'' EMBO Reports, 13(5), 469–469. [[http://doi.org/10.1038/embor.2012.46 Abstract]] | |||
* Willyard C. 2010. ''Do Parasites Make You Dumber?'' [[https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2010/06/do-parasites-make-you-dumber Article]] | |||
===<span style="font-family:'Linux Libertine, Georgia, Times, serif'; font-size: 24px; line-height: 1.2; font-weight: normal;" id="More_than_half_of_prison_staff_sexual_misconduct_involves_female_guards.2Fstaff">More than half of prison staff sexual misconduct involves female guards/staff</span>=== | ===<span style="font-family:'Linux Libertine, Georgia, Times, serif'; font-size: 24px; line-height: 1.2; font-weight: normal;" id="More_than_half_of_prison_staff_sexual_misconduct_involves_female_guards.2Fstaff">More than half of prison staff sexual misconduct involves female guards/staff</span>=== | ||