How did Introverts survive evolution?

lev21pirate · 2014-07-30T00:07:36+00:00

Guess that back in the days "approaching less" still meant you needed a lot of human interaction in order to survive. Now , thanks to modern technology, its possible to survive cutting out all physical contacts. Its a fairly recent thing.

also arranged marriage must've helped a little.

hyperrreal · 2014-07-30T00:41:56+00:00

This piece in the New York Times makes a compelling case that a certain balance of introverts/extroverts is actually selected for.

The argument is based on the observation/premise that extroverts tend to be more tolerant of risk, while introverts are more risk-adverse and thoughtful.

We even find “introverts” in the animal kingdom, where 15 percent to 20 percent of many species are watchful, slow-to-warm-up types who stick to the sidelines (sometimes called “sitters”) while the other 80 percent are “rovers” who sally forth without paying much attention to their surroundings. Sitters and rovers favor different survival strategies, which could be summed up as the sitter’s “Look before you leap” versus the rover’s inclination to “Just do it!” Each strategy reaps different rewards.

IN an illustrative experiment, David Sloan Wilson, a Binghamton evolutionary biologist, dropped metal traps into a pond of pumpkinseed sunfish. The “rover” fish couldn’t help but investigate — and were immediately caught. But the “sitter” fish stayed back, making it impossible for Professor Wilson to capture them. Had Professor Wilson’s traps posed a real threat, only the sitters would have survived. But had the sitters taken Zoloft and become more like bold rovers, the entire family of pumpkinseed sunfish would have been wiped out. “Anxiety” about the trap saved the fishes’ lives.

Next, Professor Wilson used fishing nets to catch both types of fish; when he carried them back to his lab, he noted that the rovers quickly acclimated to their new environment and started eating a full five days earlier than their sitter brethren. In this situation, the rovers were the likely survivors. “There is no single best ... [animal] personality,” Professor Wilson concludes in his book, “Evolution for Everyone,” “but rather a diversity of personalities maintained by natural selection.”

The same might be said of humans, 15 percent to 20 percent of whom are also born with sitter-like temperaments that predispose them to shyness and introversion. (The overall incidence of shyness and introversion is higher — 40 percent of the population for shyness, according to the psychology professor Jonathan Cheek, and 50 percent for introversion. Conversely, some born sitters never become shy or introverted at all.)

SirNemesis · 2014-07-30T01:52:29+00:00

Because prehistoric communities were small and close-knit, so there wasn't really a need for much "approaching" - introverts could do just as well as extraverts.

Additionally, there were a lot of hunter gatherer societies that had relatively monogamous mating and thus extraverted "players" did not have an advantage over their introverted peers (indeed the introverts would have been more stable choices of mate for the long term).

[deleted] · 2014-07-30T13:40:43+00:00

people evolved in communities smaller than the number of people you see on a normal day.

everyone knew everyone, using game and approaching wouldn't give you an advantage.

besides, unless you're extremely introverted or your only way of meeting women is in clubs, then i don't think its a negative.

ExpendableOne · 2014-07-30T18:57:42+00:00

Your question would rely on the notion that introversion/extroversion is a genetic trait that is passed down from generation to generation...rather than just a product of someone's development or childhood experiences. It's almost like asking "how did homosexuality survive evolution?" or "how did personality quirks survive evolution?". If introversion was a generic/hereditary trait, however, it could still survive just fine simply by the fact that introverted women don't have to approach/pursue, and are therefore unaffected when it comes to passing on their genes, and that there are certain situations when introverted men can still do okay(maybe through the accumulation of wealth, power or simply by being especially attractive to women).

Those_Who_Remain · 2014-07-30T00:56:40+00:00

Because introversion doesn't mean that you can't approach people, it just means that you prefer to keep to yourself. I am extremely introverted actually, but yea, in my case for example, it just means I don't give a shit about how others do things, which manifests itself in my standards for dating.

Basically, it's just a personality thing, people aren't all the same, some like being social, some don't, but even those that may tire from social interaction are just as capable of it.

Skratt · 2014-07-30T00:42:01+00:00

Can't have extroverts without introverts xD Can't have hot without cold, can't have happy without sad. Even though introverts didn't (and still don't) have women throwing their panties at them, they still get something. Therefore, their genes pass down.

TheOtherPath · 2014-07-30T01:46:03+00:00

Well, I don't think you can really compare the Roosh article you linked to what factors would have contributed to evolution.

Roosh's article is about finding easy chicks to bang that night, and using a numbers game until you find a particularly easy one.

Evolution, however, would have to do with not just finding someone to have sex with, but finding someone to mate with, with whom you'd have offspring which was strong enough to survive, which you and your wife would be around to take care of so they can grow up, etc.

If you were going back to caveman times and trying to help give your ancestors a leg up in the world, I don't think Roosh's article would do much good for them- it's certainly not advice that applies well to prehistoric times.

More broadly, TRP tends to deal with sexual strategy in not only "modern" terms but also "current" terms. It deals with actual dynamics as they are today. The fundamentals of why certain things exist may lie in evolution, but any specific tactics that are successful or not successful would depend on the context of the present-day society. As such, much of the "advice" like telling you to approach 10 chicks at a bar in the hopes at least one is really easy wouldn't be as relevant for people 100 years ago let alone 100,000 years ago.

redpill80 · 2014-07-30T03:36:33+00:00

Approach anxiety makes sense in the context of the prehistoric environment. Tribes existed in a world of limited resources. In a new tribe, approaching the wrong female could get you kicked out/ killed by the alpha male/leaders pretty quickly, and without the security of the tribe, you'd probably die soon. So evolution adapted so you'd be less likely to take the risk.

boscoist · 2014-07-30T16:54:20+00:00

*I am not an evolutionary biologist

Evolution is the study of gene frequencies over time, and apparently back in the foggy foggy past of our prehistory, being a "introvert" was not a trait that was selected against or had enough selection pressure applied to be weeded out of the gene pool. The exact reasons are irrelevant.

Time4Red · 2014-07-30T01:41:26+00:00

Evolutionary psychology is interesting, but it's not fact. A lot of it isn't testable, so some don't even call it science.

There could be half a dozen answers to your question. I could come up with a few I suppose, but I don't see the point. One potential answer: many women are introverted, and introverted women possibly prefer introverted men.

17b29a · 2014-07-30T01:09:13+00:00

more importantly, how did people that take evo psy seriously survive evolution

Title	How did Introverts survive evolution?
Author	royalanarchist
Upvotes	2
Comments	33
Date	July 30, 2014 12:03 AM UTC (11 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/PurplePillDebate
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/PurplePillDebate/comments/2c3dr4/how_did_introverts_survive_evolution/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/PurplePillDebate/how-did-introverts-survive-evolution.285214 https://theredarchive.com/post/285214

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