SNK

Wariness Around Snakes

Class: I - Natural Selection

EPA Total Score: 37 /100

Öhman, A., & Soares, J. J. F. (1993). On the automatic nature of phobic fear: Conditioned electrodermal responses to masked fear-relevant stimuli. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 102, 121–132.

Abstract: Normal Ss (n?=?64) were exposed either to pictures of snakes and spiders or to pictures of flowers and mushrooms in a differential conditioning paradigm in which one of the pictures signaled an electric shock. In a subsequent extinction series, these stimuli were presented backwardly masked by another stimulus for half of the Ss, whereas the other half received nonmasked extinction. In support of a hypothesis that suggests that nonconscious information-processing mechanisms are sufficient to activate responses to fear-relevant stimuli, differential skin conductance response to masked conditioning and control stimuli was obvious only for Ss conditioned to fear-relevant stimuli. These results were replicated in a 2nd experiment (n?=?32), which also demonstrated that the effect was unaffected by which visual half-field was used for stimulus presentation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)

DJGlass


Supporting Evidence

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any supporting Theoretical evidence for this EPA.

45/100

Submitted by DJGlass

45/100

Submitted by niruban

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any supporting Medical evidence for this EPA.

35/100

Submitted by niruban

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any supporting Cross-Cultural evidence for this EPA.

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any supporting Genetic evidence for this EPA.

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any supporting Phylogenetic evidence for this EPA.

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any supporting Hunter-Gatherer evidence for this EPA.

Supporting Evidence is evidence that suggests that this trait is an Evolved Psychological Adaptation (EPA) - i.e., that it has been shaped by natural selection to solve a particular adaptive problem.

Challenging Evidence

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any challenging Theoretical evidence for this EPA.

0/100

Submitted by DJGlass

0/100

Submitted by niruban

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any challenging Medical evidence for this EPA.

0/100

Submitted by niruban

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any challenging Cross-Cultural evidence for this EPA.

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any challenging Genetic evidence for this EPA.

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any challenging Phylogenetic evidence for this EPA.

No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any challenging Hunter-Gatherer evidence for this EPA.

Challenging Evidence is evidence that suggests that this trait is not an EPA - e.g., that it is a product of cultural learning or genetic drift, or maybe it does not exist at all. However over each line of evidence for a description.