Maryanne L. Fisher

Introduction: We developed the Competitive Altruism Survey (CAS) to test how intrasexual competition (i.e., competitive altruism) relates to Machiavellianism, Big Five personality traits, social desirability, and impression management. Methods: A sample of 103 heterosexual cisgender women aged 18 to 45 years completed an online survey. Results: Competitive altruism was strongly and positively related to Machiavellianism and negatively related to Agreeableness and was more used when directed at other women than at men. Neuroticism was correlated with anxiety and frustration that accompany strategic kindness, rather than to competitive altruism. Correlations with impression management and social desirability were unexpectedly negative; this pattern is open to several readings, one being openness about strategic intent. Open-ended responses converge with this interpretation, with women describing the strategic kindness they observe in others as occurring within workplace hierarchies, in publicized or social-media display, and in warmth that contradicts itself in private. Discussion: Our results offer preliminary self-report evidence, in a predominantly Western online sample, that women may use competitive altruism and generosity as strategies to gain a reputation in competition.

We investigate the relationship between the Big Five personality dimensions (i.e., openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism) and reproductive success, operationalized as one's number of biologically related children. The sample comprised 15,120 participants across Canada, the USA, and Japan. It was hypothesized that higher scores in extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness would correlate positively with the number of children, whereas higher neuroticism scores would correlate negatively. Data analysis supported these hypotheses for extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. However, no significant correlations were found for openness and conscientiousness. Additionally, factors such as marital status, sex/gender, age, and sexual orientation also showed significant associations with reproductive outcomes, with married individuals, females, older participants, and heterosexuals reporting more offspring. Cross-country comparisons indicated participants from the USA and Canada reported more children than those from Japan. Together, these findings contribute to the literature on personality and reproductive outcomes by demonstrating that the effects of personality traits on reproductive success are potentially influenced by both cultural context and demographic factors.

The redefinition of gender roles in modern societies has created unprecedented opportunities for women while contributing to the decreased successful outcomes of certain male populations (i.e., “male marginalization”). In Part One, we explore women’s adjustment to changes in men’s gender roles. We investigate the implications for women, analyzing how some men’s marginalization affects female reproductive choices and decision-making. We examine how these changes burden women with responsibilities of professional success and caregiving while providing autonomy for personal fulfillment. In Part Two, we address how perceived scarcity of the men who are desirable intensifies intrasexual competition, manifesting through both direct and indirect competitive strategies that strain female friendships and social networks. Despite these challenges, women also demonstrate cooperative behaviors and alliance formation, reflecting adaptations that facilitated survival. We conclude that while women’s empowerment represents progress toward gender equality, the marginalization of some men creates situations that call for thoughtful, new solutions.

Over the past three decades, psychology has documented the recurrence of specific themes in stories across cultures (e.g., love, alliances, monsters, imaginary worlds) and linked them to identifiable motivational mechanisms (e.g., mate choice, cooperation, threat detection, exploration). Yet this body of work has remained fragmented, organized around individual themes rather than integrated into a unified account of what makes narrative content psychologically engaging. Here, we propose the Motivational-Ingredient Framework. We identify a set of motivational ingredients: core narrative features, each defined by the specific motivational mechanism it activates. Drawing on evolutionary psychology, affective neuroscience, and the study of human motivation, we compile a comprehensive table of ingredients grounded in the current understanding of human motivational architecture. This framework offers a theory-driven, cross-culturally applicable foundation for the empirical study of narrative content, with implications for fields ranging from media psychology and computational humanities to education and public policy.

The goal of the current study was to explore attachment theory and reproductive success across the three cultural contexts of Japan, Canada and the USA. We investigate how adult attachment styles (secure, fearful, preoccupied and dismissive) are associated with reproductive success, as measured by the number of children. Using data collected from 15,120 participants via an online survey, we found fearful and preoccupied attachment styles were positively associated with reproductive success across all three samples, indicating that these insecure attachment styles may promote behaviours linked to larger family sizes. Conversely, secure attachment negatively predicted reproductive success in Canada and the USA but showed no significant relationship in Japan. Sex differences in attachment were observed, with women scoring higher in preoccupied attachment across cultures and men scoring higher in fearful attachment. We propose attachment styles are associated with reproductive strategies, with cultural norms moderating these associations. Collectivist values in Japan may attenuate individual attachment associations with family planning, while individualistic cultures such as Canada and the USA align secure attachment with deliberate, resource‐intensive reproductive strategies. This study advances the understanding of attachment theory by discussing its relevance to life history strategies and reproductive outcomes within diverse cultural settings.

Intrasexual competition plays a central role in human mating strategies, yet most available measures have concentrated on self-promotion and competitor derogation, leaving other competitive tactics less explored. These tools also evaluate general competitiveness rather than specifically targeting mating competition. Such limitations have resulted in an incomplete understanding, as previous research has yet to systematically assess manipulation-oriented strategies. The Mating Competition Scale (MCS) was developed to measure four theoretically distinct strategies: self-promotion, competitor derogation, mate manipulation, and competitor manipulation. An initial item pool was created based on findings from prior qualitative research and iteratively refined through quantitative analysis. The scale was validated using three independent community samples (N = 2,322). Analyses included assessments of internal consistency, exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, and tests of convergent validity with two established measures: the Intrasexual Rivalry Scale (IRS) and the Intrasexual Competition Scale (ICS). Results support a robust four-factor structure representing the four strategies, for both sex-specific versions of the scale, with the final versions showing excellent reliability (α = .93 and .97, respectively) and convergent validity with both the IRS and ICS. The MCS makes an important methodological contribution and offers researchers a comprehensive tool for advancing the study of human mating competition within evolutionary psychology and related fields.

We explore the self-reported propensity for virtue signaling of environmentalism and community-minded messages. Evolutionary psychologists have not paid much attention to virtue signaling, although it has implications for social relationships, in-group/out-group dynamics, status, mate choice, and kinship. We tested three hypotheses regarding sex differences in samples ( N = 20,423) obtained in 2020 from Canada, Japan, and the USA. First, across all samples, we hypothesized that both sexes use environmentalism and community-mindedness to engage in virtue signaling, which was supported. Second, we hypothesized that conspicuous ethical consumption, as a form of virtue signaling, is performed more by women than by men, which was not supported. Contrary to our prediction, men reported higher engagement in conspicuous ethical consumption, suggesting that status motives may have a strong role in their virtue signaling behaviors. Third, we hypothesized that known sex differences in the Big Five personality traits are linked to virtue signaling. That is, typically, women are reported to score higher than men in neuroticism, extroversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness, while men score higher on openness than women. Our findings partially support this pattern. Last, we report on intercultural differences. We close with a discussion of the usefulness of studying virtue signaling from an evolutionary perspective.