Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Jacobson, Nicholas C.
• Roche, Michael J.

Titel

Current evolutionary adaptiveness of anxiety: Extreme phenotypes of anxiety predict increased fertility across multiple generations

Ist Teil von

• Journal of psychiatric research, 2018-11, Vol.106, p.82-90

Ort / Verlag

England: Elsevier Ltd

Erscheinungsjahr

2018

Quelle

MEDLINE

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Although recent research has begun to examine the impact of elevated anxiety on evolutionary fitness, no prior research has examined anxiety across a continuum. Such research is important as the effect of traits across a continuum on fertility hold important implications for the levels and distribution of the traits in later generations. In a three-generational sample (N = 2657) the linear and quadratic relationship between anxiety and the number of children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren 15 years later was examined. The findings suggested that anxiety had a positive quadratic relationship with the number of children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren 15 years later. These relationships were not significantly moderated by sex. Moreover, most of the variance between anxiety and the number of great-grandchildren was explained by anxiety's influence on the number of children and grandchildren, as opposed to anxiety having an independent direct impact on the number of great-grandchildren. These findings suggest that extreme values from the mean anxiety are associated with increased evolutionary fitness within the modern environment.