Geoffrey Miller (psychologist)

Geoffrey F. Miller (born 1965, Cincinnati, Ohio), Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of New Mexico, is an American evolutionary psychologist.

Education

In 1987, Miller graduated from Columbia University, where he earned a BA in biology and psychology. He received his PhD in cognitive psychology from Stanford University in 1993 under the guidance of Roger N. Shepard.

Career

Miller held positions as a postdoctoral researcher in the evolutionary and adaptive systems group in the School of Cognitive and Computing Sciences at the University of Sussex, UK (1992–94); Lecturer in the Department of Psychology, University of Nottingham (1995); Research Scientist at the Center for Adaptive Behavior and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Psychological Research, Munich, Germany (1995–96); and Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Economic Learning and Social Evolution, University College London (1996–2000). He has worked at the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, since 2001, where he is now Associate Professor. In 2009, he was Visiting Scientist, Genetic Epidemiology Group, Queensland Institute of Medical Research, Australia.

Academic research

Human mental evolution

The starting point for Miller's work was Darwin's theoretical observation that evolution is driven not just by natural selection, but by the process called sexual selection.^[1] In support of his views on sexual selection, he has written The Mating Mind: How sexual choice shaped the evolution of human nature. His research states that human mate preferences, courtship behavior, behavior genetics, psychometrics, and life history patterns support the survival value of traits related to sexual selection, such as art, morality, language, and creativity. He states that the adaptive design features of these traits suggest that they evolved through mutual mate-choice by both sexes to advertise intelligence, creativity, moral character, and heritable fitness.^[2]

Evolutionary psychology of consumerism

Miller's most recent work has used Darwinism to gain an understanding of how marketing has exploited our inherited instincts to display social status for reproductive advantage.^[3] Miller argues that in the modern marketing-dominated culture, "coolness" at the conscious level, and the consumption choices it drives, is an aberration of the genetic legacy of two million years of living in small groups, where social status has been a critical force in reproduction. Miller's thesis is that marketing persuades people—particularly the young—that the most effective way to display that status is through consumption choices, rather than conveying such traits as intelligence and personality through more natural means of communication, such as simple conversation.^[4]

Miller argues that marketers still tend to use simplistic models of human nature that are uninformed by advances in evolutionary psychology and behavioural ecology. As a result, marketers "still believe that premium products are bought to display wealth, status, and taste, and they miss the deeper mental traits that people are actually wired to display—traits such as kindness, intelligence, and creativity". This, he claims, limits the success of marketing.^[5]

Clinical research

Miller's clinical interests are the application of fitness indicator theory to understand the symptoms, demographics, and behavior genetics of schizophrenia and mood disorders. His other interests include the origins of human preferences, aesthetics, utility functions, human strategic behavior, game theory, experiment-based economics, the ovulatory effects on female mate preferences, and the intellectual legacies of Darwin, Nietzsche, and Veblen.

In 2007, Miller (with Joshua Tybur and Brent Jordan) published an article in Evolution and Human Behavior, concluding that lap dancers made more money during ovulation.^[6] For this paper, Miller won the 2008 Ig Nobel Award.^[7]

Twitter obesity controversy

On June 2, 2013, Miller posted a tweet on Twitter stating, "Dear obese PhD applicants: if you didn't have the willpower to stop eating carbs, you won't have the willpower to do a dissertation #truth."^[8] Miller subsequently removed the tweet and issued two apologies ("My sincere apoplogies to all for that idiotic, impulsive, and badly judged tweet. It does not reflect my true views, values, or standards"), but not before the post was picked up by major news sources.^{[9][10][11][12][13]} Feminist blogs including Jezebel, XOJane, and Disrupting Dinner Parties criticized his public, discriminatory statement against obese individuals,^[14][15][16] and the post received additional criticism from Chris Chambers, a psychologist at Cardiff University,^[17] and Linda Bacon, a professor of Nutrition at the University of California Davis.^[18] Pascal Wallisch, research scientist at the Center for Neural Science at New York University, argued that in addition to being offensive, the claim is factually incorrect.^[19]

Miller says that the tweet was part of a research project.^[20] The institutional review boards of UNM, Miller's home university, and NYU, where he is a visiting professor, released statements saying that Miller's tweet was "self-promotional" and cannot be considered research.^[21] UNM formally censured Miller in August 2013.^[22]

Notes

References

• Geher G, Miller G (eds) Mating intelligence: sex, relationships, and the mind's reproductive system, New York, Erbaum, 2008

External links

• Geoffrey Miller's homepage at the University of New Mexico; this includes downloadable versions of several of his journal articles.
• Precis of The mating mind
• Human Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences at the University of New Mexico webpage
• Dutton D (2000) Review of The Mating Mind
• Consumerism and evolutionary fitness – Geoffrey Miller interviewed on ABC Radio National, YouTube video