Customer Reviews

A Mind of Her Own: The Evolutionary Psychology of Women

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Anne Campbell looks at why females are too easily presumed to be merely passive receivers of winning males' sperm.

Considering the enormous burden of motherhood and a mothers need for resources for both herself and her limited number of potential offspring it should follow that females will compete with each other for resources and there will be differential reproductive success amongst females.

But it is also essential for females to preserve their own health throughout their reproductive lifetime so open, physical aggression is not normally an option. (It is an option for males who can maximise their number of offspring in a brief spell of copulatory access to a number of females.)

So female competition is indirect and low-level harrassment except when the mother needs to show full aggression to directly protect her offspring.

Campbell discusses hormone studies - particularly serotonin and dopamine - suggesting that different levels of these in the sexes provide a braking system on female emotions and impulsive behaviour but less so on males. Hence greater male impulsivity, risk-taking, violence and even suicide. Only the male had the potential for reproductive gains via this weaker braking system.

Campbell also makes many more points about females and males such as the rarity of male parental care in nature and the possible reasons for monogamy eg the female trades sex for the protection of one male against numerous other males who may also be infanticidal. She also discusses female crime and female friendship.

And regarding modern women she points out that there is nothing new about women working except that women have to leave their children to do so.

This is a solid, wide-ranging book providng sound evolutionary reasons for women's psychology and behaviour. She includes the important points about variation within the sexes and the overlap of the sexes. But by considering the reality of how males and females achieved reproductive success in different ways during evolution she explains much about the differences between the sexes today.

Highly recommended.

Quite simply, I am impressed with the value and scope of this manuscript. It is the most influential piece of work written about the mind and behavior of women to appear in history (and yes that is a bold statement, read it you won't be disappointed). I say kudos for taking on a topic of such magnitude, and bringing to light the fact that women too have an evolutionary past. This book is loaded with insight about women's behaviors such as social aggression, friendship, love and marriage. And far from offering simple opinions, the ideas and explanations are backed up by a stagering mound of scientific data. Whether you are an academic or the average Jane, this book is bound to be a classic read for anyone interested in the unique behaviors of women.