When Destructive Behavior Makes Biological Sense

Social psychologists have taken on a different approach, called evolutionary biological, when explaining why “people whose early existences are largely defined by a lack of resources, instability, and violence (...) often live foreshortened lives filled with risk-taking and even crime (...) and the seemingly senseless choices that they make.”

It turns out that, on a biological level, those choices are not as reckless as they seem. Sociologists looked at how animals that live in threatening environments and therefore face insecure futures (e.g. rabbits) go about their business. They reach sexual maturity earlier, they reproduce more often and they consume their resources once they get their paws on them, not saving for later. The rabbit’s 'thinking' goes that, since there’s no bright future waiting ahead, only perils, he might as well make the most of what he has now, and spread as many genes, as fast as he can. As opposed to that, elephants, not being so threatened by other species, start to mate later in life and have one cub at a time that stays within the family for longer.

The same goes for people, it appears. The more dangerous and deprived the environment you grow up in is, the faster you learn how to adapt to it and manage it like a fully grown person.

To Belsky, the social message of life-history theory is clear. “We can’t expect people who grow up under adversity, who are impoverished, who live in a dangerous and hostile world, who can’t walk the streets without fear, to be ‘moral upstanding citizens’ because we want them to be,” he says. “Biology may be saying, take the risk, take advantage of others, hit first and ask questions later. That creates an imperative on our part to say, if we want good citizenry, we need to provide good conditions, so they can learn that the future is predictable, that others care for me, that I can control my destiny.”