President 

Doug Kenrick

In 1975, while preparing for my doctoral exams in social psychology, I wandered into a bookstore and stumbled upon Primate Behavior and the Emergence of Human Culture, by anthropologist Jane Lancaster. Aha, I thought, an ideal distraction from reading about boring experiments on cognitive dissonance!  Lancaster’s book had nothing to do with social psychology as then conceived, but convinced me that my field desperately needed an evolutionary perspective.  That perspective is prominent in my social psychology textbook with Neuberg and Cialdini, and I have coauthored a number of evolution-based papers in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (my sub-field’s most prominent empirical journal).  Here are some things I am most proud of: 1) a line of research demonstrating that age preferences in mates are universal, and can’t be explained in terms of norms of American culture, as previously assumed (e.g., Kenrick & Keefe, BBS, 1992), 2) numerous research and theory papers on how evolved “Fundamental Motives” affect various aspects of cognition, decision-making, and social behavior (e.g. Kenrick, Griskevicius, Neuberg, Schaller, Perspectives on Psychological Science, 2010), 3) amazing students in our lab, who are now active in HBES (e.g. Ackerman, Becker, Delton, Griskevicius, Li, Maner, Robertson, Tybur) 4) Two popular press books that make a much better, albeit less concise, biographical sketch (Sex, Murder, and The Meaning of Life, 2010; and The Rational Animal: How Evolution Made Us Smarter Than We Think, 2013).  If president, I would work on:

  • a) Increasing media and press outreach, including perhaps monthly short videos about recently published and/or classic findings from HBES members (similar to this or this)
  • b) Expanding membership to include not only anthropologists, biologists, economists and psychologists, but also people in other sub-disciplines not yet evolutionized.
  • c) Helping connect young members with researchers in other countries and disciplines, and with funding sources.

Martie Haselton

Martie Haselton is a Professor in the departments of Psychology and Communication at UCLA, with an appointment in the Institute for Society and Genetics. She also served as Associate Director of the National Science Foundation Interdisciplinary Relationship Science Program at UCLA. She received her Ph.D. in Psychology in 2000 from the University of Texas at Austin. Haselton studies human reproductive hormones and their relationship to social behavior, social inference, intimate relationships, and sexuality. She has explored whether human females, like other mammals, experience behavioral changes coinciding with peak fertility within the ovulation cycle. She is also known for her work articulating error management theory as an explanation for a diverse suite of adaptive cognitive biases. Her research is interdisciplinary and broadly multi-method, as reflected by her collaborations with colleagues and students in anthropology, biology, genetics, medicine, and political science. Her recent work has focused on meta-analytic syntheses of research in social endocrinology and methodological standards in that field. She is also broadly interested in evolutionary medicine and has examined the relationship between breastfeeding and maternal adaptations and the relationship between establishing new pair-bonds and immune function. Haselton has been a member of HBES for over 20 years, and has served the society in a variety of ways. She was co-editor-in-chief of Evolution and Human Behavior from 2006-2011, council member at large for HBES from 2005-2011, and Program Chair for the HBES conference in 2012. Her first book, Hormonal, will be published by Little, Brown in February of 2018. As president of HBES, she would promote the interests of the next generation of HBES scientists and create a welcoming environment for scholars of diverse theoretical, methodological, and personal backgrounds. Haselton has extensive experience with outreach to industry and the mass media, will promote the prestige and international profile of the society, and seek development opportunities to bring needed resources to its research.

 Treasurer 

Catherine Salmon

Catherine Salmon received her PhD in evolutionary psychology in1997 from McMaster University. Since 2003, she has been at the University of Redlands in southern California where she is currently a professor in the Psychology department. She is the co-author (with Donald Symons) of Warrior Lovers: Erotic fiction, evolution and female sexuality and The Secret Power of Middle Children (co-authored with Katrin Schumann). Her primary research interests include birth order and the family, reproductive suppression and dieting behaviour, and female sexuality, particularly with regard to prostitution and pornography. Currently, she is the editor-in-chief of Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences. She has been attending HBES since 1993 and has previously served on the HBES council as a member at large and more recently as treasurer over the past two years.

 Secretary/Archivist 

 

Todd K. Shackelford

Todd K. Shackelford received his Ph.D. in evolutionary psychology in 1997 from the University of Texas at Austin. Since 2010, he is Professor and Chair of the Department of Psychology at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan, where he is Co-Director of the Evolutionary Psychology Lab. In 2016, he was appointed Distinguished Professor by the Oakland University Board of Trustees. He led the founding of new Ph.D. and M.S. programs, which launched in 2012. Shackelford has published around 250 journal articles and his work has been cited about 14,000 times. Much of Shackelford’s research addresses sexual conflict between men and women, with a special focus on testing hypotheses derived from sperm competition theory. Since 2006, Shackelford has served as editor of the journal Evolutionary Psychology, and in 2014 founded the journal Evolutionary Psychological Science as Editor-in-Chief.

 Council Member at Large (choose 2 candidates)

Andreas Wilke

I am an evolutionary psychologist studying the cognitive mechanisms underlying human decision-making behavior under risk and uncertainty. I received interdisciplinary training in cognitive psychology, behavioral ecology and biological anthropology, in research groups both in the U.S. and abroad. I equally value teaching, research and rigorous methodology. Each year, about 4 to 6 students receive training in my Evolution and Cognition Lab.

I am a long-time HBES attendee (since 2001, London) who regularly presents his work at the society’s annual meetings (including about 25 presentations by now). In 2004, I co-organized the annual meeting in Berlin and have served on multiple committees/roles for HBES since then (e.g., program committees, new investigator award committee, student mentoring). In addition, I am a past recipient of the HBES Postdoctoral Researcher Award, as well as the Margo Ings Wilson Best Publication Award.

I am an Associate Professor at Clarkson University, which places a strong emphasis on undergraduate research excellence. As such, I would like to bring this focus on undergraduate research to the HBES agenda as well. For instance, I would like to better showcase the research of our next-generation scientists at our annual meetings too, and provide more support for them through mentoring activities/workshops that focus on career, training, life-balance and scholarship opportunities. Additionally, I would like to continue our international outreach as a society through the organization of regular meetings outside of North America to be held every few years.

Please see my lab webpage (which includes a full copy of my CV) for details on my work in general and video spotlighting some of my current research with students.

Viviana Weekes-Shackelford

I am an evolutionary developmental psychologist (Ph.D., 2011, Florida Atlantic University), and my research seeks to secure a clearer and more comprehensive understanding of within-family conflict, parental psychology, and female mating psychology. I am currently a Visiting Assistant Professor at Oakland University and I Co-Direct the Evolutionary Psychology Lab in the Department of Psychology. My publications and presentations are detailed at www.vivianaweekesshackelford.com.

I have been an HBES member since 1998, and have presented the results of my research at many HBES conferences. In conjunction with graduate and undergraduate students, our lab has consistently maintained a rich presence at HBES conferences. For the 2017 conference, I have agreed to serve as a panelist for the HBES Student Mentorship luncheon. I am very excited about participating! At this point in my academic career, I am confident that I can offer a unique contribution to HBES as an at-large council member. My goals as an at-large member include supporting and introducing ideas that reflect the best interests of current and prospective HBES members (faculty, post-docs, graduate students, and undergraduate students).

David Puts

I am an Associate Professor of Anthropology at Penn State. I received my BA in anthropology with a minor in mathematics from Kenyon College, MA and PhD degrees in biological anthropology from the University of Pittsburgh, and postdoctoral training in neuroscience at Michigan State University. My research focuses on the evolutionary and neuroendocrine bases of human sexuality and sex differences. I have published more than 90 articles and chapters in journals such as Evolution and Human Behavior, Hormones and Behavior, Nature Neuroscience, PLoS Genetics, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. I am co-Editor of Evolutionary Psychology and on the editorial boards of Adaptive Human Behavior and Physiology, Archives of Sexual Behavior, Evolution and Human Behavior, Evolutionary Psychological Science, and Hormones and Behavior. My research has been featured in such outlets as BBC TV and radio, Discovery Channel, The Economist, The Guardian, National Public Radio, The New York Times, and Science Magazine.

HBES has been my intellectual home society for 20 years. I received the New Investigator Award (2004), the Margo Wilson Award (2010), and the Early Career Award for Distinguished Scientific Contribution (2013) from HBES. I have served as a frequent reviewer for Evolution and Human Behavior for 15 years and have been a member of the Editorial Board since 2013. I have also served on the poster award committee at HBES, and I will be speaking at the Student Mentor Lunch this year. As an HBES council member, I will help grow evolutionary approaches to human behavior as a rigorous​, mature science and keep our society at the forefront of knowledge generation and dissemination. This will be accomplished most effectively by focusing on people, for example by promoting diversity, and through workshops, funding, and other resources directed at helping students and other early career researchers. I will work to maintain one of our greatest strengths: our cross-disciplinarity. Finally, I will facilitate outreach to increase our visibility and relevance.

Aaron Lukaszewski

Aaron Lukaszewski is Assistant Professor of Psychology at California State University, Fullerton. He received his doctorate in developmental and evolutionary psychology from UC Santa Barbara, before doing post-doctoral research in UCLA’s Center for Behavior, Evolution, and Culture. He joined HBES in 2005, since which time he has received the society’s 2010 New Investigator award and (along with his student) the 2016 Poster award. He has also served as a Consulting Editor at Evolution & Human Behavior since 2013. His research, which is done in collaboration with numerous HBES members, focuses on elucidating the underpinnings of adaptively patterned phenotypic variation across individuals and societies. Aaron considers HBES to the most important society in the human behavioral sciences, not least because it functions as a platform for the effective implementation of interdisciplinary research – an endeavor that is frequently promoted but less often actualized. He believes priorities for the future might include connecting members with aspiring graduate students, funding sources, and media opportunities. In general, though, HBES’s recent growth in membership and societal reach suggests to him that we would do well to continue on our present trajectory.

Russell Jackson

My name is Russell Jackson and I would like to serve as HBES Council Member at Large. I am currently Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of Idaho and my research focuses on evolutionary mechanisms in vision and navigation. I created Evolved Navigation Theory, through which I predicted and discovered the largest and most frequent distance illusions in humans. My work includes cross-cultural research among indigenous people of the Americas and technologically advanced methods in virtual reality. This research addresses a major cause of human mortality (falling) that I am addressing via funded projects aiming to protect labor-based workers.

Among my goals as a council member is to capitalize on our strengths and representation in the social dimensions of behavior while increasing our reach into broader areas in our disciplines. This includes formal outreach programs, as well as expanding our publicity and membership. Further, I would like to continue our tradition of supporting student members with ongoing funding. This includes expanding our offerings in professional issues intended to support our early career colleagues.

My love of HBES spans 17 years. I have brought students to our conferences and attended the open Executive Committee meetings for most of the last decade. I won our post-doctoral award and regularly serve on committees, including twice on program committee. I have brought outside funding to support our conference and organized external conferences on evolution and human behavior. Now I would like to employ these experiences as an HBES officer. Honestly, my election (or not) to our Executive Committee will do little to change my efforts for our society. I still view HBES as my home and I want to make it the best that I can for all of us. This position merely allows me to do those things more effectively.

Justin R Garcia

Justin R. Garcia is Ruth Halls Assistant Professor of Gender Studies and Associate Director for Research and Education at The Kinsey Institute, Indiana University, Bloomington. He is also Affiliate Faculty with the Cognitive Science Program, Network Science Institute, and Fairbanks School of Public Health. Garcia holds an MS in biomedical anthropology and PhD in evolutionary biology from Binghamton University. His research interests focus on the evolutionary foundations of variation in monogamy, intimacy, and sexual behavior, with a particular emphasis on biocultural approaches to sexuality, courtship, and reproductive strategies. He has published on a variety of topics related to romantic and sexual relationships, and is co-author of Evolution and Human Sexual Behavior (with Peter Gray; Harvard University Press, 2013) and co-editor of Evolution’s Empress: Darwinian Perspectives on the Nature of Women (with Maryanne Fisher and Rose Sokol Chang; Oxford University Press, 2013). He has also written about the tensions and synergies between evolutionary and feminist models of human behavior. Since 2010 he has also been Scientific Advisor to the online dating company Match.com. Justin has been an active member of HBES since 2006. If elected a Council Member at Large, he hopes to work on issues of graduate student and early career professional engagement, and on diversifying the HBES membership and intellectual scope.

Pat Barclay

I study the evolution of cooperation, especially the roles of reputation, punishment, competition over partnerships, sexual selection, and costly signaling. I apply biological markets theory to understand how people choose their social partners, how they use generosity to attract social partners, and how they compete over partners. My research combines experimental economics games, social and cognitive psychological methods, as well as evolutionary game theoretical math models. I was trained in psychology and biology departments, I publish in both of these fields, and my research is cited in fields including social and cognitive psychology, anthropology, animal behavior, and mathematical biology. I am excited to run for the position of Member-At-Large in HBES. The interdisciplinary nature of HBES makes it my “natural habitat”, and I have attended every HBES conference since 2000 (except 2016). Many of my articles are published in Evolution & Human Behavior, including two articles on E&HB’s list of the most cited articles since 2011. I won the HBES Early Career Award for Distinguished Scientific Contribution in 2015 and the HBES New Investigator Award in 2003. This all shows my long-standing interest in HBES, and I look forward to new opportunities to give back to the society. In particular, I aim to foster and increase the interdisciplinarity which makes HBES so strong.

 

 Student Representative 

Talia Shirazi

Talia is currently a first year biological anthropology PhD student studying at Penn State with David Puts. Talia received her BA in psychology with a minor in mathematics from Emory University, where she worked with behavioral neuroendocrinologist Kim Wallen to investigate the emergence of sex differences in sexual behavior across adolescence, and the factors modulating women’s sexual response during intercourse. Prior to coming to Penn State, Talia spent two years working at the National Institutes of Health evaluating the use of eye tracking paradigms to study cognition and attention. In 2016, she was awarded an NSF GRFP for her proposal using eye tracking methodology to study women’s cyclic shifts in mate preferences and sexual desire. She hopes to study the interplay between hormones and genetics in modulating women’s mating psychology and behavior. In the rare instances when she isn’t thinking about or actively doing research, you can find Talia running, pretending like she knows how to salsa dance, or spending time with friends. Her vision as HBES student representative is to create and manage an online platform for HBES students to discuss their work, disseminate current research in the field of evolution and human behavior, and encourage connections and collaborations among students.

Jennifer Kotler

I am a 5th year PhD student at Harvard University, a student of David Haig and a frequent collaborator of Max Krasnow. My background is in evolutionary psychology, having done my undergraduate thesis with Martin Daly at McMaster University. I continue to work to bridge evolutionary theory, genetics, medical science, and psychology. I have been involved with HBES since I received my BSc in 2011. I am supportive of recent changes at the HBES conference, such as the graduate student lunches with faculty and professionals from outside academia, as well as the neuroendocrinology and other pre-conferences. I would love to add a pre-conference that focuses on the application of evolutionary theory to aspects of science and health policy. Furthermore, as more and more scientists in our community take on the study of evolutionary medicine, I think we would benefit from an explicit focus on this area of interdisciplinary study. The most recent survey I can find shows only 63% of American physicians stating that they believe in evolution. I think it’s our responsibility as a scientific community to increase the communication and understanding between evolutionary theorists and the medical community, as we have much we can offer one another. A first step in that direction could include a discussion series, lunch, or pre-conference meet-up of folks interested in pursuing this goal. I am also very excited about the recently formed “Women of HBES” group, and would like to work with them to increase representation at the student level, and target outreach efforts to the student population.

Nicole Barbaro

Nicole Barbaro received her BA in Psychology (Cum Laude & Departmental Honors) from Oakland University in 2013. She then served as a Lab Manager in the psychology department at the University of Pittsburgh from 2014-2015. Nicole returned Oakland University where she completed her MS in psychology in 2017 with a Graduate Fellowship funded by the King-Chavez-Parks Initiative. Currently, Nicole is a PhD student in evolutionary psychology at Oakland University, studying under the advisement of Todd Shackelford. Her research investigates the etiology, development, and genetic underpinnings of aggressive conflict and attachment dynamics within romantic relationships using various methodologies, including self-report, longitudinal dyadic designs, experimental paradigms, and behavioral genetic modeling.

Nicole has been an active member of the Human Behavior and Evolution Society (HBES) and the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) since 2015. In 2016, Nicole co-organized the Evolutionary Psychology Preconference at SPSP, which promotes evolutionary psychological research to a diverse audience of psychologists. If elected as the Student Representative for HBES, Nicole will continue to promote the application of evolutionary theory to the study of human psychology and behavior, and work toward her broader professional goal of increasing public scientific literacy.