#256 Catherine Salmon: Evolutionary Psychology And Pop Culture
RECORDED ON SEPTEMBER 6th, 2019.
Dr. Catherine Salmon is a Full Professor in the psychology department at the University of Redlands. She is the co-author (with Donald Symons) of Warrior Lovers: Erotic fiction, evolution and female sexuality. She has written chapters in numerous books including Buss’ Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology and The Literary Animal. She is also a co-editor of the books Evolutionary Psychology: Public Policy and Personal Decisions (with Charles Crawford) Family Psychology: An Evolutionary Perspective and the Oxford Handbook of Evolutionary Family Psychology (both with Todd Shackelford), and co-author with Katrin Schuman of The Secret Power of Middle Children. Her primary research interests include birth order and the family, reproductive suppression and dieting behavior, and female sexuality, particularly with regard to prostitution and pornography. Her interest in pop culture also led to co-authoring a chapter on female wrestling fans and their fantasies in Steel Chair to the Head: The Pleasure and Pain of Professional Wrestling.
In this episode, we cover several different topics of Dr. Salmon’s work. We first talk about birth order, parental investment and sibling conflict, and also how there might be parent-offspring conflict over mates. We also refer to evolutionary approaches to dieting behavior and anorexia in women. And then we get into topics of popular culture and consumer behavior, like pornography, romance novels, and slash fiction. Near the end, Dr. Salmon tells us about her upcoming book, co-authored with Barry Kuhle, On the Origin of the Evolution Revolution: Conversations with the Pioneers of Evolutionary Biology, Anthropology, and Psychology.
Time Links:
Birth order and sibling conflict
Parent-offspring conflict over mates
Female intrasexual conflict, and dieting behavior
What men like in pornography
Why the porn industry and prostitution might be appealing to some women
The insights about human psychology that we can get from studying popular culture
Studying psychological variation
Why pornography doesn’t appeal to women in general
Male heroes in romance novels
Slash fiction
Dr. Salmon’s upcoming book – On The Origin of the Evolution Revolution
Follow Dr. Salmon’s work!
Follow Dr. Salmon’s work:
Faculty page: http://bit.ly/2lGG7lY
ResearchGate profile: http://bit.ly/2kyV8Gj
The video interviews for “On the Origin of the Evolution Revolution” (on HBES): http://bit.ly/2k3LKdD
Amazon page: https://amzn.to/2lyW3a1
Warrior Lovers: https://amzn.to/2k8mRO6
Twitter handle: @CatherineSalmon
Relevant papers:
Birth order, sex of child, and perceptions of parental favoritism: http://bit.ly/2lWSlaj
Life History Strategy and Disordered Eating Behavior: http://bit.ly/2k3VwMZ
Slash Fiction and Human Mating Psychology: http://bit.ly/2lZltxG
The Pop Culture of Sex: An Evolutionary Window on the Worlds of Pornography and Romance: http://bit.ly/2lCVcFg