A03

• Evolutionary theories are useful because they can provide an explanation for gender differences in aggression. For example, Campbell (1999) suggested that females are more likely to engage in acts of verbal, as opposed to physical, aggression as this ensures that their own survival, as well as the survival of their offspring, is not endangered.
• Such tactics also prevents females from being involved in life-threatening physical confrontations with their partners, and so further increases their chance of survival through the use of non-aggressive methods of resolving conflicts (Bess and Shackleford). This utility increases the validity of the evolutionary explanation of aggression.
• There are methodological issues associated with the use of evolutionary theories to explain current examples of aggression. For example, predominantly such studies are correlational, meaning that there is only a correlation between aggression and the use of male retention strategies. This means that the research may suffer from the ‘third factor problem’, where there may be a third contributory factor which has not been studied. These studies may also jump to make causal conclusions, when really correlations can never demonstrate a ‘cause and effect’ relationship.
• However, there is research supporting the link between sexual jealousy and aggression. The main example of this would be Shackleford’s 2005 study which found that male retention strategies are a method of expressing sexual jealousy, which leads to aggressive behaviour both towards females and other partners. This increases the reliability of evolutionary theories as a method of explaining aggression, due to this supporting evidence.