{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/102818"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/102818","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"The impact of yesterday’s territorial shortages on today’s adapted mind","abstract":"My dissertation adopts an evolutionary psychological perspective to argue that, given the relative dearth of territory that punctuated much of human evolutionary history, homo sapiens are endowed with an evolved psychological mechanism (EPM) to view threats concerning territory as especially salient and worthy of aggressive retorts. I go on to contend that variation in individuals’ ontogenetic contexts—such as sex differences between males and females—and immediate situational inputs—such as numerical superiority concerns or personal assessments of physical strength—can in some instances moderate and in other instances exacerbate the influence of this territorial EPM on conspecific aggressive behavior. My empirical tests show that while individuals do indeed demonstrate greater levels of both interpersonal and foreign policy aggression following territorial threats than non-territorial threats, the aforementioned role of one’s ontogenetic contexts and immediate situational inputs are also significant. For example, in regards to ontogenetic context, while males demonstrate greater aggression than females during offensive territorial encounters, this sex-based difference disappears during defensive territorial threats. Further, one’s immediate situational input also matters in the sense that aggression levels vary depending on whether the territorial resource under dispute was evolutionary essential for survive (e.g., water) or only gained importance relatively late in human evolution (e.g., gold). Overall, my results demonstrate that many outgrowths of territorial political violence in today’s world can often be understood via an evolutionary psychological rationale.","abstract_html":"My dissertation adopts an evolutionary psychological perspective to argue that, given the relative dearth of territory that punctuated much of human evolutionary history, homo sapiens are endowed with an evolved psychological mechanism (EPM) to view threats concerning territory as especially salient and worthy of aggressive retorts. I go on to contend that variation in individuals’ ontogenetic contexts—such as sex differences between males and females—and immediate situational inputs—such as numerical superiority concerns or personal assessments of physical strength—can in some instances moderate and in other instances exacerbate the influence of this territorial EPM on conspecific aggressive behavior. My empirical tests show that while individuals do indeed demonstrate greater levels of both interpersonal and foreign policy aggression following territorial threats than non-territorial threats, the aforementioned role of one’s ontogenetic contexts and immediate situational inputs are also significant. For example, in regards to ontogenetic context, while males demonstrate greater aggression than females during offensive territorial encounters, this sex-based difference disappears during defensive territorial threats. Further, one’s immediate situational input also matters in the sense that aggression levels vary depending on whether the territorial resource under dispute was evolutionary essential for survive (e.g., water) or only gained importance relatively late in human evolution (e.g., gold). Overall, my results demonstrate that many outgrowths of territorial political violence in today’s world can often be understood via an evolutionary psychological rationale.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Powers, Matthew Aderhold"],"institution":"University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"Ph.D.","degree_level":"Dissertation","degree_discipline":"Political Science","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Vasquez, John","Diehl, Paul","Mondak, Jeffery","Kuklinski, James"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2019,"date_issued":"2019-02-07T20:36:04Z","date_published":"2019-02-07T20:36:04Z","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:24:42Z","subjects":["Human Territoriality, Aggression, Evolutionary Psychology"],"languages":["en"],"rights":["© 2018 by Matthew A. Powers. All rights reserved."],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"http://hdl.handle.net/2142/102818","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Vasquez, John","Diehl, Paul","Mondak, Jeffery","Kuklinski, James"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Powers, Matthew Aderhold"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2019-02-07T20:36:04Z","2021-02-08T10:15:39Z","2018-12-02","2018-12"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Political Science"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Dissertation"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Ph.D."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Human Territoriality, Aggression, Evolutionary Psychology"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["© 2018 by Matthew A. Powers. All rights reserved."]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["http://hdl.handle.net/2142/102818"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["My dissertation adopts an evolutionary psychological perspective to argue that, given the relative dearth of territory that punctuated much of human evolutionary history, homo sapiens are endowed with an evolved psychological mechanism (EPM) to view threats concerning territory as especially salient and worthy of aggressive retorts. I go on to contend that variation in individuals’ ontogenetic contexts—such as sex differences between males and females—and immediate situational inputs—such as numerical superiority concerns or personal assessments of physical strength—can in some instances moderate and in other instances exacerbate the influence of this territorial EPM on conspecific aggressive behavior. My empirical tests show that while individuals do indeed demonstrate greater levels of both interpersonal and foreign policy aggression following territorial threats than non-territorial threats, the aforementioned role of one’s ontogenetic contexts and immediate situational inputs are also significant. For example, in regards to ontogenetic context, while males demonstrate greater aggression than females during offensive territorial encounters, this sex-based difference disappears during defensive territorial threats. Further, one’s immediate situational input also matters in the sense that aggression levels vary depending on whether the territorial resource under dispute was evolutionary essential for survive (e.g., water) or only gained importance relatively late in human evolution (e.g., gold). Overall, my results demonstrate that many outgrowths of territorial political violence in today’s world can often be understood via an evolutionary psychological rationale.","Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'U of I Access', the embargo will last until 2020-12-01","The student, Matthew Powers, accepted the attached license on 2018-11-30 at 10:34.","The student, Matthew Powers, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2018-11-30 at 11:03.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2018-12-02 at 11:14.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #13154 on 2019-02-07 at 14:18:35","Made available in DSpace on 2019-02-07T20:36:04Z (GMT). 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I go on to contend that variation in individuals’ ontogenetic contexts—such as sex differences between males and females—and immediate situational inputs—such as numerical superiority concerns or personal assessments of physical strength—can in some instances moderate and in other instances exacerbate the influence of this territorial EPM on conspecific aggressive behavior. My empirical tests show that while individuals do indeed demonstrate greater levels of both interpersonal and foreign policy aggression following territorial threats than non-territorial threats, the aforementioned role of one’s ontogenetic contexts and immediate situational inputs are also significant. For example, in regards to ontogenetic context, while males demonstrate greater aggression than females during offensive territorial encounters, this sex-based difference disappears during defensive territorial threats. Further, one’s immediate situational input also matters in the sense that aggression levels vary depending on whether the territorial resource under dispute was evolutionary essential for survive (e.g., water) or only gained importance relatively late in human evolution (e.g., gold). Overall, my results demonstrate that many outgrowths of territorial political violence in today’s world can often be understood via an evolutionary psychological rationale.","Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'U of I Access', the embargo will last until 2020-12-01","The student, Matthew Powers, accepted the attached license on 2018-11-30 at 10:34.","The student, Matthew Powers, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2018-11-30 at 11:03.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2018-12-02 at 11:14.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #13154 on 2019-02-07 at 14:18:35","Made available in DSpace on 2019-02-07T20:36:04Z (GMT). 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All rights reserved."],"dc:subject":["Human Territoriality, Aggression, Evolutionary Psychology"],"dc:title":["The impact of yesterday’s territorial shortages on today’s adapted mind"],"dc:type":["text"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["Political Science"],"thesis:degree_level":["Dissertation"],"thesis:degree_name":["Ph.D."],"thesis:institution_name":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:24:42Z"}