Why We Get Sick

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by Randolph M. Nesse


  9 The bond-testing idea is from Amotz Zahavi’s “The Testing of a Bond,” Animal Behaviour, 25:246–7 (1976).

  10 Information on orgasm in primates is in Donald Symons’ The Evolution of Human Sexuality (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1979).

  11 For information on concealed ovulation in humans, see Beverly Strassmann’s article in Ethology and Sociobiology, 2:31–40 (1981); Paul W. Turke’s in Ethology and Sociobiology, 5:33–44 (1984); and Nancy Burley’s in The American Naturalist, 114:835–58 (1979).

  12 The data on testis size are from R. V. Short’s chapter in Reproductive Biology of the Great Apes, edited by C. E. Graham (New York: Academic, 1984). See also A. H. Harcourt and collaborators’ article in Nature, 293:55–7 (1981).

  13 See R. R. Baker and M. A. Bellis’s “Human Sperm Competition: Ejaculate Adjustment by Males and the Function of Masturbation,” Animal Behavior, 46:861–85 (1993), and R. R. Baker and M. A. Bellis, “Human Sperm Competition: Ejaculation Manipulation by Females and a Function for the Female Orgasm,” Animal Behavior, 46:887–909 (1993). Baker and Bellis’s work on sperm counts is in “Number of Sperm in Human Ejaculates Varies as Predicted by Sperm Competition Theory,” Animal Behavior, 37:867–9 (1989). For a review of work on sperm competition, see M. Gomendio and E. R. S. Roldan’s “Mechanisms of Sperm Competition: Linking Physiology and Behavioral Ecology,” Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 8(3):95–100 (1993).

  14 For the work on jealousy, see Martin Daly and collaborators’ “Male Sexual Jealousy,” Ethology and Sociobiology, 3:11–27 (1982), and Martin Daly and Margo Wilson’s Homicide (New York: Aldine, 1989). This book contains abundant data on and detailed discussion of murders motivated by jealousy.

  15 For discussions of sex differences in human reproductive strategies, see the works by Buss, Ridley, Cronin, and Symons mentioned above.

  16 David Haig’s work is in Quarterly Review of Biology, 68:495–532 (1993). Sexually antagonistic genes are discussed by W. R. Rice in Science, 256:1436–9 (1992). The classic paper on parent-offspring conflict is R. L. Trivers’s in American Zoologist, 14:249–64 (1974). A good description is also found in his book Social Evolution (Menlo Park, Calif.: Benjamin/Cummings, 1985). For a recent review and further references, see D. W. Mock and L. S. Forbes’ article in Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 7(12):409–13 (1992).

  17 The work on human birth is in a paper presented by Wenda Trevathan at the February 1993 American Academy of Sciences meeting in Boston. Also see her book Human Birth: An Evolutionary Perspective (Hawthorne, N.Y.: Aldine de Gruyter, 1987).

  18 The work on the role of oxytocin in bonding in sheep is by E. B. Keverne et al. in Science, 219:81–83 (1983).

  19 We got our information on the Mozarts’ family tragedies mainly from pages 98–102 of Mozart in Vienna 1781–1791 by Volkmar Braunbehrens (New York: Grove Weidenfeld, 1989).

  20 On jaundice in the newborn, see John Brett and Susan Niermeyer’s article in Medical Anthropology Quarterly, 4:149–61 (1990).

  21 Defective color discrimination and other visual impairments from exposure to round-the-clock bright light in infancy are discussed by I. Abramov et al. in Journal of the American Optometry Association, 56:614–19(1985).

  22 On babies’ crying, see R. G. Barr’s “The Early Crying Paradox: A Modest Proposal,” Human Nature, 1(4):355–89 (1990).

  23 On SIDS, see James J. McKenna’s “An Anthropological Perspective on the Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS): The Role of Parental Breathing Cues and Speech Breathing Adaptations,” Medical Anthropology, 10:9–54 (1986).

  24 On parent-offspring conflict, see the Trivers citations for pp. 195–99. Also see pp. 55–58 and 234–35 of Martin Daly and Margo Wilson’s Sex, Evolution, and Behavior, 2nd ed. (Boston: Willard Grant Press, 1983).

  Chapter 14. Are Mental Disorders Diseases?

  Cases are composites to protect confidentiality.

  The Moral Animal by Robert Wright (New York: Pantheon Books, 1994) offers an excellent introduction to evolutionary psychology.

  A fine overview of work on evolution and psychiatry is Brant Wenegrat’s Sociobiological Psychiatry: A New Conceptual Framework (Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Books, 1990). Forthcoming is Evolutionary Psychiatry, by Michael McGuire and Alfonso Troisi. For an excellent introduction to animal behavior, see John Alcock’s Animal Behavior: An Evolutionary Approach (Sunderland, Mass.: Sinauer, 1993). For excellent introductions to socio-biology, see R. D. Alexander’s Darwinism and Human Affairs (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1979); R. Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1976); E. O. Wilson’s Sociobiology (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1975); E. O. Wilson’s On Human Nature (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1978); and R. Trivers’ Social Evolution (Menlo Park, Calif.: Benjamin/Cummings, 1985). For recent progress in evolutionary psychology, see The Adapted Mind, cited for p. 320.

  1 For the review that documents and emphasizes the medical orientation in current psychiatry, see Robert Michaels and Peter M. Marzuk in New England Journal of Medicine, 329:552–60 and 628–38(1993).

  2 For reviews of evolutionary approaches to emotions, see R. M. Nesse’s “Evolutionary Explanations of Emotions,” Human Nature, 1:261–89 (1990); R. Plutchik and H. Kellerman’s Theories of Emotion, vol. 1 (Orlando, Fla.: Academic, 1980); Paul Ekman’s “An Argument for Basic Emotions,” Cognition and Emotion, 6:169–200 (1992); Robert L. Trivers’s “Sociobiology and Politics,” in Sociobiology and Human Politics, edited by E. White (Toronto: Lexington, 1981); John Tooby and Leda Cosmides’s article in Ethology and Sociobiology, 11:375–424 (1990); R. Thornhill and N. W. Thornhill’s chapter in Sociobiology and the Social Sciences, edited by R. Bell (Lubbock, Tex.: Texas Tech Univ. Press, 1989); and E. O. Wilson’s Sociobiology (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1975).

  3 For a recent discussion on trade-offs between avoiding predation and other values, see A. Bouskila and D. T. Blumstein’s article in American Naturalist, 139:161–76 (1992).

  4 Walter B. Cannon’s classic is Bodily Changes in Pain, Hunger, Fear, and Rage. Researches into the Function of Emotional Excitement (New York: Harper and Row, 1929). Also see I. M. Marks’ Fears, Phobias, and Rituals (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1987); A. Öhman and U. Dimberg in Sociopsychology, edited by W. M. Waid (New York: Springer, 1984); I. M. Marks and Adolf Tobena in Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, 14:365–84 (1990); D. H. Barlow’s Anxiety and Its Disorders (New York: Guilford, 1988); and Susan Mineka et al. in Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 93:355–72 (1984).

  5 The fearful guppies are described by A. L. Dugatkin in Behavioral Ecology, 3:124–127 (1992).

  6 For a review of signal detection theory, see D. M. Green and J. A. Swets, Signal Detection Theory and Psycho-physics (New York: Wiley, 1966).

  7 R. H. Frank’s ideas are in his book Passions Within Reason: The Strategic Role of the Emotions (New York: Norton, 1988).

  8 The increasing rate of depression is documented by the Cross-National Collaborative group in “The Changing Rate of Major Depression. Cross-National Comparisons,” Journal of the American Medical Association, 268:3098–105 (1992).

  9 For general information on depression, see P. C. Whybrow et al. Mood Disorders: Toward a New Psychobiology (New York: Plenum, 1984); Emmy Gut’s Productive and Unproductive Depression (New York: Basic Books, 1989); Paul Gilbert’s Human Nature and Suffering (Hove, England: Erlbaum, 1989); and R. E. Thayer’s The Biopsychology of Mood and Arousal (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1989).

  10 The data on writers are from N. C. Andreasen’s article in The American Journal of Psychiatry, 144:1288–92 (1987).

  11 John Price’s original article is in Lancet, 2:243–6 (1967). Also see Russell R. Gardner, Jr., in The Archives of General Psychiatry, 39:1436–41 (1982), and J. S. Price and Leon Sloman’s article in Ethology and Sociobiology, 8:85s-98s (1987).

  12 The data on serotonin in vervet monkeys are in M. J. Raleigh et al. article in Brain Research, 559:181–90 (1991).
/>   13 For information on seasonal affective disorder, see N. E. Rosenthal and M. C. Blehar’s Seasonal Affective Disorders and Phototherapy (New York: Guilford, 1989); D. A. Oren and N. E. Rosenthal in Handbook of Affective Disorders, edited by E. S. Paykel (New York: Churchill Livingstone, 1992); and David Schlager, J. E. Schwartz, and E. J. Bromet in British Journal of Psychiatry, 163: 322–6 (1993). The large study suggesting an increasing rate of depression is cited for p. 214.

  14 On the studies of infant monkeys, see H. F. Harlow’s Learning to Love (New York: Aronson, 1974).

  15 For sources of information on attachment, see Robert Karen’s review “Becoming Attached,” The Atlantic, February 1990, pp. 35–70; John Bowlby’s summary of his work in The American Handbook of Psychiatry, vol. 6, edited by D. D. Hamburg and H. K. H. Brodie (1969); and M. D. Ainsworth et al. Patterns of Attachment: A Psychological Study of the Strange Situation (Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum, 1978). For a readable review of genetic focus that may influence attachment, see Galen’s Prophecy (New York: Basic Books, 1994).

  16 On child abuse, see Martin Daly and Margo I. Wilson’s Homicide (New York: Aldine, 1989); their “Abuse and Neglect of Children in Evolutionary Perspective” in Natural Selection and Social Behavior: Recent Research and Theory, edited by R. D. Alexander and D. W. Tinkle (New York: Chiron Press, 1981); S. B. Hrdy’s “Infanticide as a Primate Productive Strategy,” American Scientist, 65:40–9 (1977); and R. J. Gelles and J. B. Lancaster, editors, Child Abuse and Neglect (New York: Aldine, 1987). Mark Flinn’s article is in Ethology and Sociobiology, 9:335–69 (1988).

  17 On schizophrenia, see J. L. Karlsson’s article in Hereditas, 107:59–64 (1987), and J. S. Allen and V. M. Sarich’s in Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 32:132–53 (1988). The idea that suspiciousness may be beneficial is in a chapter by L. F. Jarvik and S. B. Chadwick in Psychopathology, edited by M. Hammer, K. Salzinger, and S. Sutton (New York: Wiley, 1972). For an interesting and testable idea about schizophrenia and its possible relationship to sleep cycles, see Jay R. Feierman’s article in Medical Hypotheses, 9:455–79 (1982).

  18 Ray Meddis’s ideas are expounded mainly in his book The Sleep Instinct (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1977); he has a shorter presentation in Animal Behavior, 23:676–91 (1975). For a general review of sleep among the Mammalia, see M. Elgar, M. D. Pagel, and P. H. Harvey’s article in Animal Behavior, 40:991–5 (1990). For general reviews of sleep and sleep research, see Alexander Borbély’s Secrets of Sleep (New York: Basic Books, 1986), and Jacob Empson’s Sleep and Dreaming (London: Faber and Faber, 1989). For the physiology of dreaming and the possible irrelevance of psychological functions, see J. A. Hobson’s The Dreaming Brain (New York: Basic Books, 1988); Ian Oswald, “Human Brain Proteins, Drugs, and Dreams,” Nature, 223:893–7 (1969); and Francis Crick and Graeme Mitchison, “The Function of Dream Sleep,” Nature, 304:111–14 (1983).

  19 For sensorimotor constraints on dreaming, see Donald Symons’ article “The Stuff That Dreams Aren’t Made Of: Why Wake-State and Dream-State Sensory Experiences Differ,” Cognition, 47:181–217(1993).

  Chapter 15. The Evolution of Medicine

  The quotation at the beginning of this chapter is the title of an article by the eminent geneticist Theodosius Dobzhansky, published in American Biology Teacher, 35:125–9 (1973).

  1 Readers may recognize the watch metaphor from Richard Dawkins’ fine introduction to evolution, The Blind Watchmaker (New York: Norton, 1986). He extended the often cited idea from William Paley’s 1802 masterpiece Natural Theology. While Paley’s book was intended to clinch the case for creationism, his many examples of exquisite design provided others, including Darwin, with superb evidence for the power of natural selection. Of particular interest is Paley’s attempt to explain convoluted design, which he attributes to the Deity’s wish to reveal His presence to man by “contrivances” of unnecessary complexity, and by constraining His creation within the bounds of fixed laws. Paley provides a sensible view of the utility of pain but then claims that death, sickness, and their unpredictability are all necessary parts of a divinely perfect world. It was thinking of this sort that inspired Voltaire to ridicule optimists like Dr. Pangloss in his novel Candide.

  2 For the role of antioxidants in aging, see Richard G. Cutler’s “Antioxidants and Aging,” American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 53:373s-379s (1991). For a brief review of current research on vitamin E, see C. H. Hennekens, J. E. Buring, and R. Peto’s “Antioxidant Vitamins—Benefits Not Yet Proved,” New England Journal of Medicine, 330:1080–1 (1994).

  3 The quote is from pp. 445–6 of René Dubos’s Man Adapting (New Haven, Conn.: Yale Univ. Press, 1965, revised 1980).

  4 The full title of Ernst Mayr’s work is The Growth of Biological Thought: Diversity, Evolution, and Inheritance (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard Univ. Press, 1982).

  5 Several good books address the logic of formulating questions about function, and we recommend them to those who harbor suspicions that evolutionary arguments are fundamentally illegitimate. It is a shame that such a simple misunderstanding should inhibit development of a whole field. See John Maynard Smith’s Did Darwin Get It Right? (New York: Chapman and Hall, 1989); E. Mayr’s “Teleological and Teleonomic, A New Analysis,” Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, 14:91–117 (1974); John Alcock’s Animal Behavior: An Evolutionary Approach, 4th ed. (Sunderland, Mass.: Sinauer, 1989); Michael Ruse’s The Darwinian Paradigm (London: Routledge, 1989), George Williams’ Natural Selection (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1992); and his Adaptation and Natural Selection: A Critique of Some Current Evolutionary Thought (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univ. Press, 1966).

  6 The Flexner report is Medical Education in the United States and Canada, The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Bulletin No. 4 (1910).

  7 For an informed view of the problems of modern medicine, see Melvin Konner’s The Trouble with Medicine (London: BBC Books, 1993).

  8 The article that calls for preventive health care is James F. Fries and collaborators’ “Reducing Health Care Costs by Reducing the Need for Medical Services,” The New England Journal of Medicine, 329:321–5 (1993).

 

 

 


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