| dc.description.abstract | The general premise behind evolutionary theory as it pertains to emotion and cognition is that, over the course of human evolutionary history, challenges often occurred for which some emotional or cognitive responses were more fitness-enhancing than others. While the adaptive values of negative affect (NA) and, to a somewhat lesser extent, positive affect (PA) have been investigated previously, similar work with regard to subjective-well being (SWB) has been rare. This study used structural equation modeling to explore a signal hypothesis of subjective well-being, in which the component of SWB known as satisfaction with life (SWL) is hypothesized to play an important role in indicating to an individual how well his or her execution of adaptive traits is maximizing the individual's evolutionary fitness. Consequently, in samples of male (n = 107) and female (n = 106) college students, SWL, PA, and NA were regressed onto eight latent constructs purportedly indicative of evolutionary fitness: physical health, attractiveness, body-mass index, short-term mating behaviors, social instrumentality, material well-being, general intelligence (g), and fluctuating asymmetry. Relationships among the latent variables, as well as between the two groups, suggested that the use of these eight prospective measures in modeling fitness was tenable and that these constructs were equivalent between genders. In the structural models, markedly different patterns emerged for the two groups. Among males, social instrumentality was shown to be the nearly exclusive predictor of SWL, PA, and NA; among females, a much broader array of variables appeared to be relevant in predicting the components of subjective well-being. These findings suggest that, while gaining mastery over one's social environment may be of principal importance in maximizing the SWB of young males, SWB of young females may be significantly influenced by additional factors such as high attractiveness, avoidance of short-term mating strategies, and access to material resources, despite several seemingly paradoxical relationships among these factors. Overall, these findings offered qualified support to the signaling hypothesis, while a discussion of study limitations elucidated several reasons why findings from the model for each gender may have offered differential support for the hypothesis. | |
