SocraticGadfly: EvPsych gets yet another kick in the pants

July 08, 2008

EvPsych gets yet another kick in the pants

Alleged male-female differences in visiospatial skills are wiped out with just a few hours of video game therapy.
While men scored better than women before training, after playing Medal of Honor both women and men improved significantly. The difference between males and females after the training was not significant — the gap between women and men was almost completely erased. Even more impressively, the researchers retested both groups five months later and found that both groups were still performing as well as they had right after training. The group playing Ballance showed no significant gains.

This once again shows there’s a big difference between the quasi-metaphysical storytelling of Evolutionary Psychology (with caps) versus the legitimate, evolutionary biology-driving evolutionary psychology.

(I’m waiting for the inevitable comments by Greg and any other diehard Ev Psychers who will try to explain this away.)

I cover the basics of the difference between Ev Psych and ev psych here, based in fair degree on the writings of philosopher of science David Buller, which he explains in further detail in this Scientific American interview.

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