How does evolutionary history and personal history affect behavior? Provide an example of each.

      Deckers (2010), "evolutionary history or the remote past refers to the effects of millions of years of natural selection in shaping motives and emotions that aided survival of the individual and the species" (p. 10). The assumption can be made that an individual's behavior is determined and is currently shaped by natural selection processes, which are behaviors that favor the replication of the genome will preferentially survive (Tallis, 2013). An individual's behavior is a reflection of how he or she is designed in order to optimize the chances of survival. Examples can be religious, political, or personal beliefs, which an individual possess or believes in because he or she thinks those beliefs, improve the chances of survival. Personal history is a reference of an individual’s experience from the moment of conception to the present (Deckers, 2010). The experiences from conception to present aid in shaping one’s motives, and system of values about incentives (Deckers, 2010). An example of this would be if an individual lived in an unhealthy environment, which would help shape his or her motives and system of values about incentives to strive for living in a healthier. Therefore, that individual may be motivated to go to or back to college, or find a higher paying career field that provides more incentives to change his or her environment.

 Reference

Deckers, L. (2010). Motivation: Biological, psychological, and environmental (3rd ed.). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

Tallis, R. (2013). On the Human. Retrieved from http://onthehuman.org/2009/09/does-evolution-explain-our-behaviour/