Andrew George Thomas

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Dr Andrew G Thomas is a Welsh evolutionary psychologist and a senior lecturer at Swansea University, UK.^[1] His research focuses primarily on evolutionary explanations of human mating preferences and how they differ between sexes and cultures.^[2][3]

Career and Academic Contributions[edit]

Dr Thomas received his undergraduate degree in Psychology from Cardiff University, UK, and then a PhD from Swansea University, UK, where he subsequently started teaching and conducting research in evolutionary psychology and mating preferences in humans. He is currently a senior lecturer at Swansea University, and runs his own lab^[1][3].

Among the most prominent pieces of Dr Thomas' work is "The Ape That Thought It Was A Peacock"^[4], an academic article where he and his colleagues critique the widely accepted males-compete/females-choose (MCFC) model as a primary sexual selection strategy in our evolutionary history. They argue that this model overemphasises the short-term mating strategy of males focusing on producing as many offspring as possible. Instead, they promote the Mutual mate choice (MMC) model, which describes the mate selection as being mutually discriminating between sexes and better accounts for the amount of involvement in child-rearing in males. Consequently, the perceived sex differences in mating are greatly reduced compared to the WCMC model^[5].

Research of Dr Thomas also investigated topics such as the influence of past sexual experiences on perceived attractiveness^[6] or comparison of trait-desirability in long-term partners between Eastern and Western countries.^[7] Beyond these topics, his lab also produced pioneering research regarding incels (involuntary celibates)^[8][9], polygyny^[10], and voyeurism^[11].

Dr Thomas is a member of Human Behaviour and Evolution Society, European Human Behaviour and Evolution Association, a Chartered member of the British Psychological Society, and a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.^[12] He is also one of the founding members of Welsh Evolutionary Psychology Network (WEPN)^[13].^[14]

Media presence[edit]

Apart from his academic contributions, Dr Thomas is also known for his twitter page Darwin Does Dating, where he is sharing the latest research in his field.^[2] As an expert in evolutionary psychology and human mating, Dr Thomas was interviewed by The Guardian where he criticised the concept of a popular Netflix show Sexy Beasts, saying that it interferes with the evolved mate selection mechanisms and, as a consequence, causes the participants to make suboptimal mating choices^[15]. A subsequent article written by Dr Thomas was published in Psychology Today named "Animal Masks Probably Don't Make for Better Dating Decisions", further elaborating on the criticisms raised.^[16]

In addition to The Guardian, Dr Thomas' work also appeared in Time, The Daily Mail, The Sun, and he was a guest speaker in BBC's X-Ray, BBC Radio Wales.^[2] He was also the first Welsh guest featured on Modern Wisdom podcast.^[17]

References[edit]

External links[edit]

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