Weaklings' Sharper Hearing Helps Them Escape Danger?

Weaklings' Sharper Hearing Helps Them Escape Danger?

Brian Handwerkfor National Geographic News
May 15, 2009
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/05/090515-weakling-hearing.html


Human weaklings have evolved a sharper sense of hearing that gives them advance notice when trouble is coming, according to a new study.
The research revealed that to the less physically fit, approaching sounds are more likely to sound closer than they really are.
Scientists first studied how men hear looming sounds that steadily approach the listener.
Most respondents—regardless of their fitness—believe the sources of such sounds have reached them before they actually have. This adaptation may help humans sense and escape danger.

"If you err on the side of safety, that genetic characteristic will be passed on,"

said lead study author John Neuhoff, an evolutionary psychologist at the College of Wooster in Ohio.
But people with wimpy physiques—who lack the strength to overpower threats or the cardiovascular fitness to outrun them—display more extreme versions of the auditory alarm system.
"If you're physically fit, you can react quickly. So you don't need as much of a margin of safety as you would if you were a typical couch potato," Neuhoff explained.
(Explore an interactive on human evolution.)
Mind Control
Previous research has shown that women also responded to looming sounds more quickly than men, who would typically have a physical advantage.
Neuhoff said his team plans to examine possible links between a host of physical characteristics that may be important for dealing with threats. He noted that the mind also plays a large role.
"There are a lot of things that contribute to how much room for error you need," he said.
"We've shown that physical fitness is one thing that contributes, but things like your personality or your propensity for risk-taking could also be factors."
Neuhoff presents his findings next week at the Acoustical Society of America Meeting in Portland, Oregon.