Self-employed, privately and publicaly funded research biologist, 1981 - present.

Education
Ph.D., Biology, 1988. Cornell University, Section of Neurobiology and Behavior, Ithaca, NY.
Major: Behavioral Biology, S.T. Emlen and P.W. Sherman.
Minor 1: Ecological Genetics, T. Eisner.
Minor 2: Bioorganic Chemistry, J. Meinwald.
Minor 3: Neurobiology, R. Harris-Warrick.

Doctoral Thesis: The Adaptive Functions of Sequential Polyandry in the

Spider Linyphia litigiosa (Linyphiidae). (Linyphia litigiosa = Neriene litigiosa).

B.A. Zoology & B.A. Botany / High Honors, 1981. University of Montana, Missoula , MT.
Bachelor 's Thesis: Freezing LowTemperature Tolerance in the Cactus

Opuntia fragilis (Cactaceae).

Post-Doctoral Experience

• NATO-NSF Fellow, 1989-1991. Sexual selection and disease in the spider Linyphia litigiosa. Sexual selection and disease research; environmentalmicrobiological training. (16 months). University of Oxford, UK. Department of Zoology, William D. Hamilton principal sponsor;NERC Institute of Virology and Environmental Microbiology, D.H.L. Bishop and P. Nuttall co-sponsors.
• NSF Postdoctoral Research Associate, 1988-1989. Research on same topic as NATO fellowship. Funds provided as supplement to research grant of R. Thornhill and D. Ligon based on independent proposal by Watson (12 months). University of New Mexico, Biology Department, R. Thornhill and O. Baca advisors.

Interests
My research focuses on the evolution of social and sexual behavior in taxa ranging from arthropods to humans. My nearly continuous studies of the sexual selection system of the sierra dome spider, Neriene (= Linyphia) litigiosa (Linyphiidae), are now in their 31st year.

I am a member of the University of New Mexico's Human Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences faculty. My work with humans is on a heuristic, theoretical level, although several of my students do empirical research on Homo sapiens evolutionary psychology. I am interested in developing evolutionarily principled conceptual models of human intrapsychic organization. I am especially interested in the adaptive function of conscious experience and the relationship between phenomenal consciousness and unconscious information processing. As a window into the organization and regulation of subjective experience as as a fascinating phenomenon in and of itself, the evolution of religiosity is a special interest (see link to my current course, above). I also have an ongoing interest in the adaptive significance of various forms of psychological pain which the unconscious mind imposes on our conscious world. Drs. Edward H. Hagen, Paul W. Andrews, J. Anderson (Andy) Thomson, and I have worked together to publish in-depth modern analyses of the potential evolutionary adaptive functions of unipolar depression. I run interactive workshops for mental health professionals, as well as members of the general public who seek a better understanding of evolutionary ideas concerning religiosity, psychological pain, and mental disorders, often with my Gestalt Therapist colleague John D. Wymore and through the Oasis continuing education program. I also interact with practitioners of various contemplative traditions who have an interest in understanding more scientifically the source and meaning of their common and expanded inner experiences. I involve a number of graduates and advanced undergraduates in my research and also spend a good deal of time advising students in their own projects.

Humans are built to be intensely curious about the workings of minds. We instinctively hunger for insights that will allow us to predict and influence the operation of the minds of fellow humans, animals. Less commonly, people are non-superficially curious about their own minds and the hyper-subjective self-models and world-models they create "for us." Behavioral ecology is essentially the analysis of animal and human mental design from the combined perspectives of ecology and evolutionary biology. The analyses conducted by evolutionarily oriented behaviorists often include work to elucidate the functional design of a specific component of the subject species' mind (i.e., how it gathers and processes information relevant to a given fitness-related opportunity or threat, and responds with behavioral outputs), as well as the fitness consequences and phylogenetic history of mental design. My interests center on the evolutionary adaptiveness of contingent responses of animal and human minds to problems associated with sexual reproduction and social living.

In my work with animals, I focus on interdisciplinary studies of invertebrates designed to reveal the information content of sexual signals, and thus the adaptive significance of decision rules used to choose mates and determine which mates contribute genetically to offspring. Methodologically, my research is rooted deeply in observation and experimentation in nature. However, it also includes laboratory components involving carbon dioxide and oxygen respirometry to measure individual variation in metabolic capacities and rates of aging, as well as morphometric analysis to quantify variation in developmental competence via measures of fluctuating asymmetry. These aspects of my research help me to understand how sexual signals convey information about fundamental aspects of individual viability fitness.

In my research on the metabolic capacities demonstrated by male sierra dome spiders during their elaborate strenuous copulatory courtship, I have found that both metabolic efficiency (microwatts consumed per unit of courtship performance) and maximum metabolic rate (sustainable aerobic capacity) are positively selected by females. Two overt male traits independently predict fertilization success, body mass and copulatory vigor (measured as intromission rate - the number of separate genitalic connections made by the male per unit time during copulatory courtship). Metabolic efficiency is correlated with male body mass (even after compensating for the expected allometric relationship) and aerobic capacity with copulatory vigor. Interestingly, due to some fundamental physiological trade-off (maybe to do with accelerating rates of oxygen free-radicals with increasing metabolic rates) efficiency and maximum metabolic rate are negatively correlated in the general male population. By simultaneously selecting positively for both of these traits, females are effectively shopping for the least negative trade-off between these two viability-enhancing physiological traits. In other words, by cross-referencing body mass and courtship performance, females are sexually selecting for metabolic power: the maximum rate at which the male can perform useful metabolic work (as opposed, for example, to "work" wasting calories in the production of heat or unnecessary movement.

My respirometric studies also suggest that males sierra domes that are more sexually competitive early in life, have more rapid rates of physiological senescence (as measured by their resting and active metabolic rates). Rates of aging of prospective sires may be a major issue for female sierra dome spiders. In my study population, variable proportions (up to 85 percent!) of gravid females die each year just before they are able to oviposit. They apparently succumb just a bit too early to a rickettsial disease, but their susceptibility may be related to their level of senescence. While a given female's sons can hope to reproduce early in adult life, and so not have their reproductive fitness threatened by the sexual competitiveness/senescence rate trade-off, daughters may be reproductively crippled by genes received from of a rapidly aging father because females always need to live long to have a chance to yolk up a sizeable clutch of eggs. Early reproduction is not an option for females, so they cannot easily escape the competitiveness/senescence rate trade-off.Thus, to protect their daughters, female sierra dome spiders may need to resist always mating with only the most sexually impressive males in thepopulation, especially early in the mating season before the ravages of aging have taken their toll on the superstuds of the population.

I also have a longstanding interest in human evolutionary psychology. Here is a an excellent introduction to evolutionary psychology specifically geared to understanding the evolution of violence in humans and other animals, including especially intraspecific violence.

I have long been exploring implications of a Darwinian analysis of human cognitions and emotions for psychotherapeutic methodologies. My most detailed work in this area, with Dr. P.W. Andrews and several other colleagues, addresses the possible adaptive functions evolution of unipolar depression. I presented an integrated "social niche change" or "social navigation" model covering both minor and major depression, as well as associated suicidality, to the Human Behavior and Evolution Society and, as an invited keynote address, to the Across Species Comparisons and Psychopathology (ASCAP) group, in July 1998. Another keynote address was invited by The Association for the Advancement of Philosophy and Psychiatry and given at their regional New York City meeting on Evolutionary Theory and Psychopathology, in November 1999. A paper on this topic has been published in the Journal of Affective Disorders (October 2002; v. 72, pp. 1-14; get PDF); more recent related papers by myself and colleagues are available on my evolution of depression web site.

A lifelong special interest concerns how insights from evolutionary psychology may critically, practically, and constructively illuminate the "sacred psychologies" and introspective methods of contemplative traditions such as Zen Buddhism, Sufism and Gnostic Christianity. To the extent that philosophical positions rely on thought unchecked by evidence, and both confuse and close doors to further inquiry, they are likely to be wrong. Scientists everywhere readily embrace this attitude. I contend that this same attitude long has been a cornerstone of genuine spiritual work - a radically empirical albiet introspective personal activity that predates yet can compliment western science in one's pursuit for self-knowledge. For more on this, click here to see the description of my workshops at the Esalen Institute, Big Sur, California.

Current & Recent Grants

• Dr. Jacek Radwan ( Jagiellonian University , Krakow, Poland ) has been awarded a 9 month Fullbright Fellowship (9 mos, from September 2000) to collaborate with me in a study of sexual selection in acarid mites. Radwan has been studying these mites since 1990. In several species of this family, two male morphs co-occur within the same populations: fighter males have a thickened and sharply terminated third pair of legs, whereas scramblers have unmodified legs. Modified legs are used during fights to stab (often mortally) other males. A male’s morph is determined in different ways (genetically or environmentally) in different species, and thus this system provides a unique opportunity to identify ecological factors favoring male dimorphism against monomorphism and those favoring environmental morph determination against genetic. The study will have two main objectives: 1. To determine if individuals possessing phenotypes associated with lower fitness (scramblers) carry more deleterious mutations. 2. To determine whether superior metabolic competence and lower fluctuating asymmetry are associated with low mutational load and to resolve which of these measures is a better candidate for a general fitness index.
• Hypoxia and larval care in the bumble bee, Bombus occidentalis (12 mos, from May 1996), Montana's NSF EPSCoR program. With Drs. P. Kukuk and D.L. Kilgore.
• Courtship Energetics and the Heritability of Metabolic Competence (24 mos, from July 1994-96), National Science Foundation. Behavioral and respirometric research on the sierra dome spider Linyphia litigiosa.
• REU supplement to support undergraduate summer research relating rates of aging to sexual competitiveness in the sierra dome spider (6 mos), NSF.

GRADUATE HIGHLIGHTS

• New York State College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Distinguished Teaching Award,1986.
• Max-Planck-Institut für Verhaltensphysiologie, Visiting Research Associate, 1986. Four month appointment at Seewiesen, Germany. Established lab for protein electrophoresis, and performed paternity studies for doctoral research and population genetic analyses of the social spiders Stegodyphus dumicola and S. mimosarum. Profs. W. Wickler and U. Reyer, sponsors.
• National Institute of Mental Health Integrative Training Grant, 1985. For work on chemical communication and courtship in the red-spotted newt (Notophthalmus viridescens)and the spider Linyphia litigiosa (1 yr tuition,stipend and supplies).
• National Institute of Mental Health Integrative Training Grant, 1984. Chemical communication and courtship in the red-spotted newt (1 yr tuition, stipend and supplies).
• NSF Dissertation Improvement Grant, 1983. Reproductive behavior of the spider Linyphia litigiosa.
• Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles Graduate Research Grant, 1983. Sexual selection and chemical communication and courtship in the red-spotted newt.
• Sigma Xi Grant-in-Aid (Cornell Chapter), 1983. Reproductive behavior of the spiderLinyphia litigiosa, and chemical communication in the red-spotted newt.
• Graduate Research Assistantship, 1983. Performed electrophoretic paternity analyses on Belding's ground squirrel (Spermophilus beldingi) and the spider Linyphia litigiosa, with Paul W. Sherman and Bernard May (one semester tuition, stipend and research allowance).
• Sigma Xi Grant-in-Aid (National), 1982 and 1983. Reproductive behavior of the spiderLinyphia litigiosa.

PUBLICATIONS

• Watson, P.J. and Vasquez, M. 1981. Comparative ecology of Woodsia scopulina sporophytes and gametophytes. American Fern Journal 71, 3-9. (Thanks to the amazing Dr. Herb Wagner for helping me perform my first published research.) get PDF
• Watson, P.J. 1986. Transmission of a female sex pheromone thwarted by males in the spider Linyphia litigiosa (Linyphiidae). Science 233, 219-221. get PDF or view abstract ; view unpublished photo of web reduction in progress; there is also this.
• Watson, P.J. 1988. The adaptive function of sequential polyandry in the spider Linyphia litigiosa (Linyphiidae). Ph.D. Thesis. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University.
• Watson, P.J. 1990. Female-enhanced male competition determines the first mate and principal sire in the spider Linyphia litigiosa (Linyphiidae). Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 26,77-90. get PDF
• Watson, P.J. 1991. Multiple paternity and first mate sperm precedence in the sierra dome spider, Linyphia litigiosa. Animal Behaviour 41, 135-148. get PDF
• Watson, P.J. 1991. Multiple paternity as genetic bet-hedging in female sierra dome spiders (Linyphia litigiosa: Linyphiidae). Animal Behaviour 41, 343-360. get PDF
• Watson, P.J. 1993. Foraging advantage of polyandry for female sierra dome spiders (Linyphia litigiosa: Linyphiidae) and assessment of alternative direct benefit hypotheses. American Naturalist 141, 440-465. get PDF or view abstract
• Watson, P.J. and Thornhill, R. 1994. Fluctuating asymmetry and sexual selection. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 9, 21-25. get PDF or view abstract
• Watson, P.J. and Lighton, J.R.B. 1994. Sexual selection and the energetics of copulatory courtship in the sierra dome spider, Linyphia litigiosa. Animal Behaviour 48, 615-626. get PDF or  view abstract
• Watson, P.J. 1995. Dancing in the dome. Natural History 104(3), 40-43. link to full article or get quality PDF
• Watson, P.J. 1998. Nonrandom multi-male mating by females increases offspring growth rates in the spider Neriene litigiosa (Linyphiidae). Animal Behaviour 55, 387-403. get PDF or view abstract
• Watson, P.J., Arnqvist, G. and Stallman, R.R. 1998. Sexual conflict and the energetic costs of mating and mate choice in water striders. American Naturalist 151, 46-58. view abstract
• Watson, P.J. and Andrews, P.W. 2002. Toward a revised evolutionary adaptationist analysis of depression: the social navigation hypothesis. Journal of Affective Disorders 72, 1-14. get PDF
• Radwan, J., Watson, P.J., Farslow, J., and Thornhill, R. 2003. Procrustean analysis of fluctuating asymmetry in the bulb mite, Rhizoglyphus robini Claparede (Astigmata: Acaridae). Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 80, 499-505. get PDF
• deCarvalho, T.N., Watson, P.J., and Field, S. 2004. Costs increase as ritualized fighting progresses within and between phases in the sierra dome spider, Neriene litigiosa. Animal Behaviour 68, 473-482. get PDF
• Cline-Brown, K., and Watson, P.J. 2005. Investigating major depressive disorder from an evolutionary adaptationist perspective: fitness hindrances and the social navigation hypothesis. In: Focus on Depression Research. Devito, J.T., editor. Nova Science Publishers, Inc. Hauppauge, NY . get info.
• Hagen, E.H., Watson, P.J. and Hammerstein, P. 2008. Gestures of Despair and Hope: A View on Deliberate Self-harm From Economics and Evolutionary Biology. Biological Theory 3, 123-138. get PDF
• Keil P.L., and Watson, P.J. 2010. Assessment of self, opponent, and resource assessment during male-male contests in the sierra dome spider, Neriene litigiosa: Linyphiidae. Animal Behaviour 80, 809-820. get PDF

Manuscripts

• For additional results concerning decision-making processes during male-male fights in sierra dome spiders, see the doctoral dissertation of my graduate student Pamela L. Keil.
• Franklin , M., Watson, P.J., and Bercovitz, R. Submitted, under revision. Contingent behavioral incitation of male-male fighting by penultimate female sierra dome spiders. Animal Behaviour. See Carleton College press release.
• Hagen, E., Watson, P.J., and Thomson, J.A. Submitted. Loves’ Labours Lost: Major depression as an evolutionary adaptation to obtain help from those with whom one is in conflict. Lancet.
• Keil, P., Watson, P.J., Field, S., and deCarvalho, T.N. Factors affecting the escalation of male-male fights in the sierra dome spider, Neriene litigiosa (Linyphiidae). In Prep.
• deCarvalho, T.N., and Watson, P.J. Energetic consequences for soapberry bugs of feeding on preferred versus non-preferred chemically protected seeds. In Prep.
• Watson, P.J. The energetic costs of copulatory courtship in the sierra dome spider and female choice for metabolic power. In Prep.
• Watson, P.J. Female choice: a genetic trade-off between sexually competitive and rapidly ageing sires in the sierra dome spider. In Prep.
• Watson, P.J., Fagerlund, R., Willingham, M., Polinsky, K, Kang, J. and Kayser, A. Submitted, extended MS In Prep. Evidence of injurious male-male aggression and female chemical incitation in the lek mating system of a new species of fairy moth (Incurvariidae; Lepidoptera). view abstract

ADDITIONAL PROJECTS

• Associate Editor, Frontiers in Evolutionary Psychology.
• My current major projects are manuscripts on the evolution of human consciousness and the evolution of religiosity. You'll have to wait a while for most of these, so if you are wondering what I'm thinking, take my course.
• I am collaborating with Katherine Cauthen of the psychology department on an empirical project designed to test an honest signaling of commitment hypothesis of religiosity. We will be doing an experiment designed to pit my "information / intellectual property security hypothesis" against the "pathogen (contagion evasion) hypothesis" of religiosity. Briefly we predict that the information security hypothesis will do a much better job of explaining individual variation in religiosity per se, while the pathogen hypothesis will do a better job of explaining shifts in generalized xenophobia.
• Local physiological adaptation and the energetic costs of alternative morphs in the soapberry bug, Jadera haematoloma (Hemiptera). Respirometric studies of different populations across North America in search of divergences in basic physiological traits.
• Feeding preferences and the energetics of food detoxification. Collaborating with Dr. Tagide deCarvalho investigating the energetic costs of dealing with plant defensive secondary compounds in preferred and non-preferred foods in soapberry bugs
• The role of male-male competition and female pheromones in the lek mating system of a fairy moth, Adela sp. (Adelidae). Examining the role of female pheromones and male-male assaults in a new species of fairy moth. Collaboration with taxonomist Richard Fagerlund and students from my summer behavior courses.
• Evolutionary Psychology Workshops. In collaboration with evolutionary Gestalt psychotherapist John D. Wymore, these conceptual and experiential workshops are designed for mental health professionals, personal growth counselors, and interested lay people. Various 1-2 day workshops explore evolutionary insights into (1) the structure of the human mind and the possible adaptive functions of diverse forms of psychological pain and "dysfunction," (2) the dynamic properties of human attention and the fundamental nature of awareness and self-awareness, and (3) the functional significance of unipolar depression in human social life, introducing a detailed new adaptive model of both minor and major depression with rich clinical implications. Overall, these workshops are aimed at persons having a serious interest in the adaptive design of the human psyche, the potential adaptive value of psychological pain, and the potential therapeutic or personal growth value of enhanced awareness and more objective self-understanding. Contact us for information on upcoming workshop offerings.
• Fluctuating asymmetry and sexual success in male mayflies.
• The adaptive function of sexual mimicry of males by female damselflies. Collaborating with undergraduates from my 1994 & 1996 field courses.
• Multi-week zero-benefit guarding of aphid colonies by carpenter ants: slave-making aphids or investing ants?
• The effects of operational sex ratio and female hunger on mating propensity and duration in three water strider species (Aquarius remigis, Gerris buenoi, G. incurvatus). Collaborating with undergraduates from my summer field courses.
• A Darwinian critique of psychotherapeutic intervention strategies. I am in the early stages of research for a book aimed at evaluation of treatment methods used in a spectrum of psychotherapeutic traditions.
• Development of methods to quantify levels of fluctuating asymmetry using morphometric programs based on thin plate splines relative warp analysis.
• Nutrition, re-mating propensity and contingent female sexual preferences in mormon crickets. Field and laboratory study conducted by my Animal Behavior field course from 1994-2000.

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