The Evolution of Desire: Strategies of Human Mating

by David M. Buss

Overview

A “drop-dead shocker” (Washington Post Book World) that uses evolutionary psychology to explain human mating and the mysteries of love If we all want love, why is there so much conflict in our most cherished relationships? To answer this question, we must look into our evolutionary past, argues prominent psychologist David M. Buss. Based one of the largest studies of human mating ever undertaken, encompassing more than 10,000 people of all ages from thirty-seven cultures worldwide, The Evolution of Desire is the first work to present a unified theory of human mating behavior. Drawing on a wide range of examples of mating behavior — from lovebugs to elephant seals, from the Yanomamö tribe of Venezuela to online dating apps — Buss reveals what women want, what men want, and why their desires radically differ. Love has a central place in human sexual psychology, but conflict, competition, and manipulation also pervade human mating — something we must confront in order to control our own mating destiny.

Updated to reflect the very latest scientific research on human mating, this definitive edition of this classic work of evolutionary psychology explains the powerful forces that shape our most intimate desires.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780465093304
Publisher:	Basic Books
Publication date:	12/27/2016
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Pages:	368
Sales rank:	468,014
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

David M. Buss is professor of psychology at the University of Texas at Austin and the author of many books, including When Men Behave Badly, Why Women Have Sex, The Murderer Next Door, The Dangerous Passion, and the textbook Evolutionary Psychology, now in its fifth edition. He has written for publications including the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Psychology Today. He lives in Austin, Texas.

What People are Saying About This

John Tooby and Leda Cosmides

"A tour de force!"

Editorial Reviews

An ambitious addition to the ever-growing shelves of books on sex wars.... Buss is refreshingly evenhanded.

Elle

Clear, coherent, and convincing.... [What] makes it intriguing are the insights it offers into our behavior and the behavior of our partners, lovers, and friends.

Philadelphia Inquirer

In the pursuit of a mate, women prefer men who possess money, resources, power and high social status, while men tend to seek attractive, youthful women who will remain sexually faithful. This finding emerged from a global survey by Buss and colleagues of 10,047 persons in 37 cultures, from Australia to Zambia. Women and men are often at cross-purposes in mate selection, sexual relations and affairs. In a provocative study, Buss, a University of Michigan psychology professor, attributes these differences to ingrained psychological mechanisms which he argues are universal across cultures and rooted in each gender's adaptive responses over millennia of human evolution. One area, however, where Buss finds common ground between men and women is in their ruthless use of deception, sexual display and denigration of rivals in the pursuit of a partner. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Presents a unified theory of human mating behavior based on a study encompassing over 10,000 people representing 37 cultures. By looking at our evolutionary past and the results of the mating study, the author draws an often disturbing picture of mating strategies and motives. As Buss admits, "Much of what I discovered about human mating is not nice." Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

Evolutionary psychology--or, in the vernacular, "instinct"--rules the dating and mating game, and this scientist's discoveries are bound to clash with theories of patriarchy that purport to account for male dominance of wealth. Buss' synthesis of many studies conforms with popular wisdom: Women want an older man with actual or potential means; men want an attractive, younger woman; and men have a much greater proclivity for promiscuity than do women. Why? The reasons reside in vestigial "cues" that favored reproduction in the pre-agricultural epoch of human development. Then, when a poor decision in mate selection imposed devastating material costs on the female, a dialectic of attraction strategies developed so that a desirable mate could be gained, held, and defended against interlopers. The ancestral origin, Buss explains, is apparent in courting techniques (such as his researchers recorded in singles bars) or in the emotion of jealousy, the actuator in alerting and defeating rivals. Libraries may be overrun by anecdotal accounts of sex, even the good ones like "Sex: An Oral History" by Harry Maurer . But Buss steps back from the mechanics and emotions of the matter and insightfully complements the multitude.

Gilbert Taylor

"David Buss examines that most quintessential of biological desires in the context of modern biology—the ultimate explanations for why we have the thoughts and feelings we do. It is a book filled with insight, surprises, and lucid explanations of the latest ideas and discoveries from the sciences of love and sex."—Steven Pinker, author of How the Mind Works

"A drop-dead shocker."—Washington Post Book World

"Clear, coherent, and convincing…[What] makes it intriguing are the insights it offers into our behavior and the behavior of our partners, lovers and friends."—Philadelphia Inquirer

“Ambitious.…Buss is refreshingly evenhanded.”—Elle

From the Publisher