Steve Stewart-Williams - Sex Quotes

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Given that sociobiological theories offer an explanation for the cross-species trend [in sex differences], whereas SRT [Social Role Theory] does not, it would be rash to accept Wood and Eagly's conclusion that sociobiological theories are outmoded or outdated.

Steve Stewart-Williams
A truly integrative model of sex differences would weave together sociobiological theories and sociocultural theories. SRT [Social Role Theory] simply rejects the sociobiological theories. Indeed, to a large extent, the theory is a reaction against those theories — an attempt to frame an alternative explanation for the findings of evolutionary psychology. It seems reasonable to conclude, then, that Wood and Eagly's biosocial theory is essentially a traditional social theory disguised as a biosocial theory.

Steve Stewart-Williams
This is especially important when addressing less statistically savvy audiences. Such audiences could perhaps be encouraged to think of two normal distributions, one representing males and the other females. Instead of imagining that natural selection creates two distinct psychological types — a male type and a female type, described by the mean values for each group — they could be encouraged to imagine that natural selection pushes the male and female distributions closer together or further apart. This simple expedient may help people to visualize the effects of natural selection on average sex differences without at the same time losing sight of the variation within each sex.

Steve Stewart-Williams
We are a species in which both sexes have their equivalents of the peacock's tail. Indeed, when it comes to physical beauty, the usual sex difference has arguably been reversed: Females are the showier sex.

Steve Stewart-Williams
A similar analysis applies within the realm of mate preferences. Several commentators pointed out that sex differences in human mate preferences are generally quite small... As such, the central claim in EP [evolutionary psychology] should probably be "Human beings evolved to put a fair amount of weight on good looks in a mate" rather than "Men evolved to put more weight on good looks than women." Again, the latter statement is true but potentially misleading. This sounds like a contradiction, but it is not; the statement is misleading if it is given undue weight.

Steve Stewart-Williams
In some domains, women are more sexually selected than men; one could say in these cases that women have the larger peacock's tail. An example can be found in the domain of physical attractiveness. Women are typically rated as better looking than men, by both men and women. The difference is plausibly a consequence of the fact that, although both sexes care about good looks in a mate, on average, men care somewhat more. This means that, since this sex difference first evolved, there has been a somewhat stronger selection pressure on women than men for physical attractiveness — the opposite of what we find in peacocks.

Steve Stewart-Williams
Our claim is not that pair bonding is humanity's singular mating pattern. Our claim instead is simply that the pair bond is the most common setting for sex and reproduction in our species, that it has been for a long time, and that this has left a deep imprint on our evolved nature.

Steve Stewart-Williams