Evolutionary developmental psychology

The field of evolutionary developmental psychology can potentially broaden the horizons of
mainstream evolutionary psychology by combining the principles of Darwinian evolution by natural
selection with the study of human development, focusing on the epigenetic effects that occur between
humans and their environment in a way that attempts to explain how evolved psychological
mechanisms become expressed in the phenotypes of adults. An evolutionary developmental
perspective includes an appreciation of comparative research and we, among others, argue that
contrasting the cognition of humans with that of nonhuman primates can provide a framework with
which to understand how human cognitive abilities and intelligence evolved. Furthermore, we argue
that several «immature» aspects of childhood (e.g., play and immature cognition) serve both as
deferred adaptations as well as imparting immediate benefits. Intense selection pressure was surely
exerted on childhood over human evolutionary history and, as a result, neglecting to consider the early
developmental period of children when studying their later adulthood produces an incomplete picture
of the evolved adaptations expressed through human behavior and cognition.