Child mortality and parental grief: An evolutionary analysis. (December 2020) - Reynolds, Tania
Abstract: Across most of human history, infant and child mortality rates were very high, suggesting the death of a child was a challenge faced by many ancestral parents. Prolonged grief likely harmed grievers' fitness, yet grief is ubiquitous and often protracted, thereby presenting a puzzle for evolutionary arguments. We integrate existing theories of grief with patterns of parental bereavement to examine how human psychology has been shaped to respond to the death of a child. We contend that variation in life history strategy may explain the relative difficulty with which individuals recover from losing a child. We propose that the same physiological mechanisms underlying detachment and grief during dissolved romantic relationships may also underlie the intensity of parental attachment and bereavement. This theoretical review thus integrates evolutionary theory with extant grief research to provide a functional analysis of the immense suffering associated with the loss of a child. Highlights: Child death was very common across human history. Grief, including parent grief, is very costly to grievers' fitness. Evolutionary explanations of grief must account for extreme fitness costs. Variation in life history strategy may explain variation in grief intensity. Mechanisms underlying romantic breakup response may also underlie grief response.