Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

The Structure of the Mini-K and K-SF-42

A Psychological Network Approach

  • Published:
Human Nature Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Life history theory is a fruitful source of testable hypotheses about human individual differences. However, this field of study is beset by unresolved debates about basic concepts and methods. One of these controversies concerns the usefulness of instruments that purport to tap a unidimensional life history (LH) factor based on a set of self-reported personality, social, and attitudinal variables. Here, we take a novel approach to analyzing the psychometrics of two variants of the Arizona Life History Battery: the Mini-K and the K-SF-42. Psychological network analysis generates models in which psychological variables (thoughts, feelings, or behaviors) comprise the nodes of a network, while partial correlation coefficients between these variables comprise the edges of the network. Centrality indices (strength, closeness, and betweenness) operationalize each node’s importance based on the pattern of the connections in which that node plays a role. Because childhood environments are hypothesized to influence adult LH, we tested the hypothesis that among the Mini-K items, and the K-SF-42 scales, those that tap relationships with parents are central to the networks (pairwise Markov random fields) constructed from these instruments. In an MTurk sample and an undergraduate sample that completed the Mini-K, and an MTurk sample that completed the K-SF-42, this hypothesis was falsified. Indeed, the “relationships with parents” items were among the most peripheral in all three networks. We propose that network analysis, as an alternative to latent variable modeling, offers considerable potential to test hypotheses about the input-output mappings of specific evolved psychological mechanisms.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Baldini, R. (2015). Harsh environments and “fast” life history strategies: What does the theory say? BioRxiv. https://doi.org/10.1101/014647.

  • Barbaro, N., Boutwell, B. B., Barnes, J. C., & Shackleford, T. K. (2017). Genetic confounding of the relationship between father absence and age at menarche. Evolution and Human Behavior, 38, 357–365.

    Google Scholar 

  • Belsky, J., Steinberg, L., & Draper, P. (1991). Childhood experience, interpersonal development, and reproductive strategy: An evolutionary theory of socialization. Child Development, 62, 647–670.

    Google Scholar 

  • Black, C. J., Figueredo, A. J., & Jacobs, W. J. (2017). Substance, history, and politics: An examination of the conceptual underpinnings of alternative approaches to the life history narrative. Evolutionary Psychology, 15. https://doi.org/10.1177/1474704916670402.

  • Borsboom, D., & Cramer, A. O. (2013). Network analysis: An integrative approach to the structure of psychopathology. Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 9, 91–121.

    Google Scholar 

  • Boschloo, L., Van Borkulo, C. D., Rhemtulla, M., Keyes, K. M., Borsboom, D., & Schoevers, R. A. (2015). The network structure of symptoms of the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders. PLoS One, 10, e0137621.

    Google Scholar 

  • Boutyline, A., & Vaisey, S. (2017). Belief network analysis: A relational approach to understanding the structure of attitudes. American Journal of Sociology, 122, 1371–1447.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, G. J., Laland, K. N., & Borgerhoff-Mulder, M. (2009). Bateman’s principles and human sex roles. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 24, 297–304.

    Google Scholar 

  • Copping, L. T., Campbell, A., & Muncer, S. (2014). Psychometrics and life history strategy: The structure and validity of the high K strategy scale. Evolutionary Psychology, 12, 200–222.

    Google Scholar 

  • Copping, L. T., Campbell, A., Muncer, S., & Richardson, G. B. (2017). The psychometric evaluation of human life histories: A reply to Figueredo, Cabeza de Baca, Black, Garcia, Fernandes, Wolf, and Woodley (2015). Evolutionary Psychology, 15. https://doi.org/10.1177/1474704916663727.

  • Costantini, G., Epskamp, S., Borsboom, D., Perugini, M., Mõttus, R., Waldorp, L. J., & Cramer, A. O. (2015). State of the aRt personality research: A tutorial on network analysis of personality data in R. Journal of Research in Personality, 54, 13–29.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cramer, A. O., Van der Sluis, S., Noordhof, A., Wichers, M., Geschwind, N., Aggen, S. H., et al. (2012). Dimensions of personality as networks in search of equilibrium: You can’t like parties if you don’t like people. European Journal of Personality, 26, 414–431.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cramer, A. O., Waldorp, L. J., van der Maas, H., & Borsboom, D. (2010). Comorbidity: A network perspective. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 33, 137–150.

    Google Scholar 

  • Del Giudice, M. (2014). An evolutionary life history framework for psychopathology. Psychological Inquiry, 25, 261–300.

    Google Scholar 

  • Del Giudice, M. (2018). Evolutionary psychopathology: A unified approach. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Del Giudice, M., & Belsky, J. (2011). The development of life history strategies: Towards a multi-stage theory. In D. M. Buss & P. H. Hawley (Eds.), The evolution of personality and individual differences (pp. 154–176). New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Del Giudice, M., Gangestad, S. W., & Kaplan, H. S. (2015). Life history theory and evolutionary psychology. In D. M. Buss (Ed.), The handbook of evolutionary psychology (Vol. 1, 2nd ed., pp. 88–114). Hoboken: Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Del Giudice, M., Klimczuk, A. C. E., Traficonte, D. M., & Maestripieri, D. (2014). Autistic-like and schizotypal traits in a life history perspective: Diametrical associations with impulsivity, sensation seeking, and sociosexual behavior. Evolution and Human Behavior, 35, 415–424.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ellis, B. J., & Bjorklund, D. F. (2012). Beyond mental health: An evolutionary analysis of development under risky and supportive environmental conditions: An introduction to the special section. Developmental Psychology, 48, 591–597.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ellis, B. J., Figueredo, A. J., Brumbach, B. H., & Schlomer, G. L. (2009). Fundamental dimensions of environmental risk: The impact of harsh versus unpredictable environments on the evolution and development of life history strategies. Human Nature, 20, 204–268.

    Google Scholar 

  • Epskamp, S., & Fried, E. I. (2018). A tutorial on regularized partial correlation networks. Psychological Methods, 23(4), 617–634. https://doi.org/10.1037/met0000167.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Epskamp, S., Borsboom, D., & Fried, E. I. (2018). Estimating psychological networks and their accuracy: A tutorial paper. Behavior Research Methods, 50, 195–212.

    Google Scholar 

  • Epskamp, S., Cramer, A. O., Waldorp, L. J., Schmittmann, V. D., & Borsboom, D. (2012). qgraph: Network visualizations of relationships in psychometric data. Journal of Statistical Software, 48, 1–18.

    Google Scholar 

  • Figueredo, A. J. (2007). The Arizona Life History Battery. http://www.u.arizona.edu/~ajf/alhb.html

  • Figueredo, A. J., Cabeza de Baca, T., Black, C. J., García, R. A., Ferreira, F. H. B., Wolf, P. S. A., & Woodley, M. A. (2015). Methodologically sound: Evaluating the psychometric approach to the assessment of human life history [Reply to Copping, Campbell, and Muncer, 2014]. Evolutionary Psychology, 13, 299–338.

    Google Scholar 

  • Figueredo, A. J., Garcia, R. A., Menke, J. M., Jacobs, W. J., Gladden, P. R., Bianchi, J., Patch, E. A., Beck, C. J. A., Kavanagh, P. S., Sotomayor-Peterson, M., Jiang, Y., & Li, N. P. (2017). The K-SF-42: A new short form of the Arizona Life History Battery. Evolutionary Psychology, 15. https://doi.org/10.1177/1474704916676276.

  • Figueredo, A. J., Vásquez, G., Brumbach, B. H., & Schneider, S. M. R. (2007). The K-factor, covitality, and personality: A psychometric test of life history theory. Human Nature, 18, 47–73.

    Google Scholar 

  • Figueredo, A. J., Vásquez, G., Brumbach, B. H., Schneider, S. M. R., Sefcek, J. A., Tal, I. R., et al. (2006). Consilience and life history theory: From genes to brain to reproductive strategy. Developmental Review, 26, 243–275.

    Google Scholar 

  • Figueredo, A. J., Vásquez, G., Brumbach, B. H., Sefcek, J. A., Kirsner, B. R., & Jacobs, W. J. (2005). The K-factor: Individual differences in life history strategy. Personality and Individual Differences, 39, 1349–1360.

    Google Scholar 

  • Figueredo, A. J., Wolf, P. S. A., Olderbak, S., Gladden, P. R., Fernandes, H. B. F., Wenner, C., et al. (2014). The psychometric assessment of human life history strategy: A meta-analytic construct validation. Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences, 8, 148–185.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fruchterman, T. M. J., & Reingold, E. M. (1991). Graph drawing by force-directed placement. Software: Practice and Experience, 21, 1129–1164.

    Google Scholar 

  • Geary, D. C. (2002). Sexual selection and human life history. Advances in Child Development and Behavior, 30, 41–104.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gruijters, S. L. K., & Fleuren, B. P. I. (2018). Measuring the unmeasurable: The psychometrics of life history strategy. Human Nature, 29, 33–44.

    Google Scholar 

  • Isvoranu, A. M., Borsboom, D., van Os, J., & Guloksuz, S. (2016). A network approach to environmental impact in psychotic disorders: Brief theoretical framework. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 42, 870–873.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jeschke, J. M., Gabriel, W., & Kokko, H. (2008). R-strategists/K-strategists. In S. E. Jørgensen & B. D. Fath (Eds.), Encyclopedia of ecology (pp. 3113–3122). Oxford: Elsevier.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lakoff, G. (2002). Moral politics: How liberals and conservatives think. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lukaszewski, A. W. (2019). Evolutionary perspectives on the mechanistic underpinnings of personality. The Handbook of Personality Dynamics and Processes (in press). Elsevier. (Preprint: https://psyarxiv.com/b4hc3/).

  • Manson, J. H. (2015). Life history strategy and the HEXACO personality dimensions. Evolutionary Psychology, 13, 147470491501300104.

    Google Scholar 

  • Manson, J. H. (2017). Are extraversion and openness indicators of a slow life history strategy? Evolution and Human Behavior, 38, 552–560.

    Google Scholar 

  • Musek, J. (2007). The general factor of personality: Evidence for the big one in the five-factor model. Journal of Research in Personality, 41, 1213–1233.

    Google Scholar 

  • Olderbak, S., Gladden, P. R., Wolf, P. S. A., & Figueredo, A. J. (2014). Comparison of life history strategy measures. Personality and Individual Differences, 58, 82–88.

    Google Scholar 

  • R Core Team. (2019). R: A language and environment for statistical computing (version 3.3.0). Vienna: R Foundation for Statistical Computing. Retrieved from https://www.r-project.org/.

    Google Scholar 

  • Richardson, G. B., Chen, C.-C., Dai, C.-L., Brubaker, M. D., & Nedelec, J. L. (2017a). The psychometrics of the mini-K: Evidence from two college samples. Evolutionary Psychology, 15, 1474704916682034.

    Google Scholar 

  • Richardson, G. B., Sanning, B. K., Lai, M. H. C., Copping, L. T., Hardesty, P. H., & Kruger, D. J. (2017b). On the psychometric study of human life history strategies: State of the science and evidence of two independent dimensions. Evolutionary Psychology, 15. https://doi.org/10.1177/1474704916666840.

  • Rushton, J. P. (1985). Differential K theory: The sociobiology of individual and group differences. Personality & Individual Differences, 6(4), 441–452.

    Google Scholar 

  • South, S. J., Haynie, D. L., & Bose, S. (2005). Residential mobility and the onset of adolescent sexual activity. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 67, 499–514.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stearns, S. C. (1992). The evolution of life histories. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stearns, S. C., & Rodrigues, A. M. M. (2020). On the uses of “life history theory” in evolutionary psychology. Evolution and Human Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2020.02.001.

  • Tibshirani, R. (1996). Regression shrinkage and selection via the lasso. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society B, 58, 267–288.

    Google Scholar 

  • Trivers, R. L. (1972). Parental investment and sexual selection. In B. Campbell (Ed.), Sexual selection and the descent of man (pp. 136–179). Chicago: Aldine.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wilson, M., & Daly, M. (1997). Life expectancy, economic inequality, homicide, and reproductive timing in Chicago neighborhoods. British Medical Journal, 314, 1271–1274.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zietsch, B. P., & Sidari, M. J. (2019). A critique of life history approaches to human trait covariation. Evolution and Human Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2019.05.007.

Download references

Acknowledgments

We thank Jacob Foster for discussions. Portions of this research were funded by the Academic Senate of the University of California, Los Angeles.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anthropology and Center for Behavioral, Evolution and Culture, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, USA

    Joseph H. Manson & Kristine J. Chua

  2. Department of Psychology, California State University, Fullerton, Fullerton, CA, USA

    Aaron W. Lukaszewski

Authors
  1. Joseph H. Manson
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Kristine J. Chua
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Aaron W. Lukaszewski
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Joseph H. Manson.

Additional information

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Electronic supplementary material

ESM 1

(PDF 1.72 mb)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Manson, J.H., Chua, K.J. & Lukaszewski, A.W. The Structure of the Mini-K and K-SF-42. Hum Nat 31, 322–340 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12110-020-09373-6

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12110-020-09373-6

Keywords

Search

Navigation