Centre for Psychology and Evolution

The Centre for Psychology and Evolution provides a structure for mentorship, collaboration, and team-building among the evolutionarily oriented researchers and students in the School of Psychology.

Our researchers apply evolutionary theory in various ways, including using big data, social psychology experiments, animal cognition studies, digital simulations, mathematical modelling, and statistical genetics.

Though based in the UQ School of Psychology, the multidisciplinary nature of our field has attracted researchers from the UQ School of Biology and the UQ School of Economics as well.

We meet fortnightly to discuss prominent papers relevant to the field or new work from our members. 

Representative Research

• Suddendorf, T., Redshaw, J., & Bulley, A. (2022). THE INVENTION OF TOMORROW: A natural history of foresight. New York: Basic Books.
• Langley, M., & Suddendorf, T. (2022). Archaeological evidence for thinking about possibilities in pre- and early Homo sapiens. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 377: 20210350.
• Suddendorf, T (2018), Two key features created the human mind: Inside our heads. Scientific American, 319, 42-47. 
• Suddendorf, T. (2013). THE GAP – The science of what separates us from other animals. New York: Basic Books. 
• Suddendorf, T. & Corballis, M.C. (2007).  The evolution of foresight: What is mental time travel and is it unique to humans? Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 30, 299-351.
• Redshaw, J., & Suddendorf, T. (2016). Children’s and apes’ preparatory responses to two mutually exclusive possibilities. Current Biology, 26(13), 1758-1762.
• Redshaw, J., & Suddendorf, T. (2020). Temporal junctures in the mind. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 24(1), 52-64.
• Redshaw, J., & Ganea, P. A. (2022). Thinking about possibilities: mechanisms, ontogeny, functions and phylogeny. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 377(1866), 20210333.
• Redshaw, J. (2019). Re-analysis of data reveals no evidence for neonatal imitation in rhesus macaques. Biology Letters, 15(7), 20190342.
• Armitage, K. L., Bulley, A., & Redshaw, J. (2020). Developmental origins of cognitive offloading. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 287(1928), 20192927. 
• Zietsch, B. P., Sidari, M. J., Abdellaoui, A., Maier, R., Långström, N. J., Guo, S., Beecham, G. W., Martin, E. R., Sanders, A. R., Verweij, K. J. H. (2021). Antagonistic pleiotropy may help explain the evolutionary maintenance of same-sex sexual behaviour. Nature Human Behaviour, 5, 1251–1258.
• Harper, K. T., Stanley, F., Sidari, M. J., Lee, A. J., & Zietsch, B. P. (2022). The role of accurate self-assessments in optimizing mate choice. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.
• Zietsch, B. P. & Sidari, M. J. (2020). A critique of life history approaches to human trait covariation. Evolution and Human Behavior, 41, 527-535.
• Lee, A. J., Sidari, M. J., Murphy, S. C., Sherlock, J. M., & Zietsch, B. P. (2020). Sex differences in misperceptions of sexual interest can be explained by men projecting their own interest onto women. Psychological Science, 41, 527-535.
• Zietsch, B. P., Lee, A. J., Sherlock, J. M., Jern, P. (2015). Variation in women’s facial masculinity preference is better explained by genetic differences than by previously identified context-dependent effects. Psychological Science, 28, 1440-1448.
• Lee, A. J., Sidari, M. J., Murphy, S. C., Sherlock, J. M., & Zietsch, B. P. (2020). Sex differences in misperceptions of sexual interest can be explained by men projecting their own interest onto women. Psychological Science, 41, 527-535.

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