Here’s an example, which I will review the comments from and use to develop a sort of standard structure, which I will then incorporate in the top level post for future. So please comment both on the idea and my expression of it, and make suggestions for what basic info should be included either in response to this or in response to the primary article.
Area: Evolutionary Psychology
Topic: Genetic versus “cultural” influence on mate attraction.
Specific problem: There’s a belief that various aspects of physical attraction are genetically determined. It is difficult to separate genetic effects from cultural effects. This is an attempt to try to control for that, to see how (in)substantial the effects of culture are. The underlying idea is that, while different cultures also have different genetic makeups, different times in the same geographic area may see different cultures with much more related genetic makeups.
The actual experiment: Sample a group of people (possibly just one sex per experiment) and obtain their views on physical attractiveness. Show them images of people, or drawings, or ask questions about what physical qualities they would find desirable in a mate. (e.g. An attractive member of the opposite sex would be taller than me—strongly agree, agree, disagree, strongly disagree). Then, and this is the expensive part, use the exact same survey on people’s offspring at about the same age. It may be ideal to compare people with aunts and uncles rather than parents, as parents are likely to have a more direct non-genetic effect on preferences.
This is a rather general description, but it should be perfectly adequate for someone in the relevant field to design a very effective and insightful experiment. It could even easily be incorporated as part of a larger experiment tracking qualities between generations.
One minor protocol thing: if it’s a good idea to limit the sample group based on sex, then it would also be a good idea to limit based on sexual orientation, since the cultural factors that affect opposite-sex attraction are quite different from those that affect same-sex attraction, and there may be a difference in the genetic factors as well.
Here’s an example, which I will review the comments from and use to develop a sort of standard structure, which I will then incorporate in the top level post for future. So please comment both on the idea and my expression of it, and make suggestions for what basic info should be included either in response to this or in response to the primary article.
Area: Evolutionary Psychology
Topic: Genetic versus “cultural” influence on mate attraction.
Specific problem: There’s a belief that various aspects of physical attraction are genetically determined. It is difficult to separate genetic effects from cultural effects. This is an attempt to try to control for that, to see how (in)substantial the effects of culture are. The underlying idea is that, while different cultures also have different genetic makeups, different times in the same geographic area may see different cultures with much more related genetic makeups.
The actual experiment: Sample a group of people (possibly just one sex per experiment) and obtain their views on physical attractiveness. Show them images of people, or drawings, or ask questions about what physical qualities they would find desirable in a mate. (e.g. An attractive member of the opposite sex would be taller than me—strongly agree, agree, disagree, strongly disagree). Then, and this is the expensive part, use the exact same survey on people’s offspring at about the same age. It may be ideal to compare people with aunts and uncles rather than parents, as parents are likely to have a more direct non-genetic effect on preferences.
This is a rather general description, but it should be perfectly adequate for someone in the relevant field to design a very effective and insightful experiment. It could even easily be incorporated as part of a larger experiment tracking qualities between generations.
Have you seen this study yet?
This is a very cool idea.
One minor protocol thing: if it’s a good idea to limit the sample group based on sex, then it would also be a good idea to limit based on sexual orientation, since the cultural factors that affect opposite-sex attraction are quite different from those that affect same-sex attraction, and there may be a difference in the genetic factors as well.