The “straw man” prior expectation of the dominant social psychology paradigm is that humans should behave with perfect rationality and high ethical standards. The more modest claim of evolutionary psychologists is that humans have evolved specific adaptations for adaptive problems that were reliably present in the ancestral environment. Outside that restricted range of problems, one should not expect optimal behavior.

Del Giudice addresses a complex and pertinent theoretical issue: the evolutionary adaptiveness of sex differences in attachment styles in relation to life history strategy. Although we applaud Del Giudice for calling attention to the problem, we regret that he does not sufficiently specify how attachment styles serve as an integral part of a coordinate life history strategy for either sex.

Social roles theorists claim that differences between the sexes are of limited consequence. Such misperceptions lead to misunderstanding the important role of sexual selection in explaining phenotypic differences both between species and within humans. Countering these claims, we explain how sexual dimorphism in humans affect expressions of artistic display and patterns of male and female aggression across the ovulatory cycle.