Competition

War is a male activity. Organized fighting and killing by groups of women against other groups of women has simply not existed at any point in human history, and given the wide range of diversity to be found across human cultures, the consistency with which males are the organizers and perpetrators of group conflict has led many scholars to conclude that the male propensity for group violence is rooted in more than the learning of culturally prescribed gender roles. Evolutionary psychologists have studied war and conflict with the assumption that a predisposition for warfare has evolved in males because it has historically (and prehistorically) enhanced their reproductive success. Hence, the origins of warfare can ultimately be found in the competition between males for status and ...