Donald Symons (born 1942) is an American anthropologist best known as one of the founders of

evolutionary psychology Evolutionary psychology is a theoretical approach in psychology that examines cognition and behavior from a modern evolutionary perspective. It seeks to identify human psychological adaptations with regards to the ancestral problems they evol ...

, and for pioneering the study of

human sexuality Human sexuality is the way people experience and express themselves sexually. This involves biological, psychological, physical, erotic, emotional, social, or spiritual feelings and behaviors. Because it is a broad term, which has varied ...

from an evolutionary perspective. He is one of the most cited researchers in contemporary sex research. His work is referenced by scientists investigating an extremely diverse range of sexual phenomena. Harvard psychologist

Steven Pinker Steven Arthur Pinker (born September 18, 1954) is a Canadian-American cognitive psychologist, psycholinguist, popular science author, and public intellectual. He is an advocate of evolutionary psychology and the computational theory of mind. ...

describes Symons' ''

The Evolution of Human Sexuality ''The Evolution of Human Sexuality'' is a 1979 book about human sexuality by the anthropologist Donald Symons, in which the author discusses topics such as human sexual anatomy, ovulation, orgasm, homosexuality, sexual promiscuity, and rape, at ...

'' (1979) as a "groundbreaking book" and "a landmark in its synthesis of evolutionary biology, anthropology, physiology, psychology, fiction, and cultural analysis, written with a combination of rigor and wit. It was a model for all subsequent books that apply evolution to human affairs, particularly mine." Symons is

Professor Emeritus ''Emeritus'' (; female: ''emerita'') is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor, or other person who has been "permitted to retain as an honorary title ...

in the Department of Anthropology at the

University of California, Santa Barbara The University of California, Santa Barbara (UC Santa Barbara or UCSB) is a public land-grant research university in Santa Barbara, California with 23,196 undergraduates and 2,983 graduate students enrolled in 2021–2022. It is part of the U ...

. His most recent work, with Catherine Salmon, is ''Warrior Lovers'', an evolutionary analysis of

slash fiction Slash fiction (also known as "m/m slash") is a genre of fan fiction that focuses on romantic or sexual relationships between fictional characters of the same sex.Bacon-Smith, Camille. "Spock Among the Women." New York Times Sunday Book Review, ...

References

Selected publications

*Symons, D. (1978) '' Play and Aggression: A Study of Rhesus Monkeys''. Columbia University Press *Symons, D. (1979) ''

''. New York: Oxford University Press. *Symons, D. (1987) "If we're all Darwinians, what's the fuss about?" in Crawford, Smith & Krebs, ''Sociobiology and Psychology'', 121–146. *Symons, D. (1989) "A critique of

Darwinian anthropology Darwinian anthropology describes an approach to anthropological analysis which employs various theories from Darwinian evolutionary biology. Whilst there are a number of areas of research that can come under this broad description (Marks, 2004) so ...

," in ''Ethology and Sociobiology'', 10: 131–144. *Symons, D. (1990) "Adaptiveness and adaptation," in ''Ethology and Sociobiology'', 11: 427–444. *Symons, D. (1992) "On the use and misuse of Darwinism in the study of human behavior" in Barkow, J., Cosmides, L. & Tooby, J. (eds) (1992) ''The Adapted Mind: Evolutionary psychology and the generation of culture'' (New York: Oxford University Press) *Symons, D. (1993) "The stuff that dreams aren't made of: Why wake-state and dream-state sensory experiences differ." Cognition, 47: 181–217. *Symons, D. (1995) "Beauty is in the adaptations of the beholder: The evolutionary psychology of human female sexual attractiveness" pp. 80–120 in Abramson, P.R. and Pinkerton, S.D. (eds.) Sexual Nature/Sexual Culture, The University of Chicago Press. *Salmon, C. and Symons, D. (2003) ''Warrior Lovers''. Yale University Press.

External links

* HBES Interview Series - Don Symons. of Symons describing his career. Living people American anthropologists American anthropology writers American male non-fiction writers Anthropology educators Evolutionary psychologists Psychological anthropologists University of California, Santa Barbara faculty 1942 births {{sex-stub