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The Developmental Origins of Health and Disease: Adaptation Reconsidered

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Evolutionary Thinking in Medicine

Abstract

It is now well established that an individual’s experience in the womb can have long-term consequences for their health and well-being. From an evolutionary perspective, it can be predicted that organisms will respond to their early conditions adaptively, maximising their prospects for survival and reproductive prospects under the circumstances. However, relatively little attention is given to the fact that there are multiple ways by which such ‘developmental plasticity’ may evolve. It is necessary to consider kinds of plasticity that can involve something other than an individual organism adapting to an external physical environment. Notably, adaptive developmental plasticity occurs between traits within an individual’s body, as well as between individuals (e.g. between mother and foetus). Taking such an inclusive perspective on the nature of developmental plasticity suggests alternative conclusions to the interpretation of patterns of health and disease, and to which kinds of intervention might be expected to be effective.

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Acknowledgments

I thank the editors and members of the Evolutionary Anthropology Research Group and the Anthropology of Health Research Group in the Department of Anthropology at Durham University.

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  1. Department of Anthropology, Durham University, Durham, UK

    Ian J. Rickard Ph.D.

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  1. Ian J. Rickard Ph.D.
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Correspondence to Ian J. Rickard Ph.D. .

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  1. Oxford, United Kingdom

    Alexandra Alvergne

  2. Oxford, United Kingdom

    Crispin Jenkinson

  3. Paris, France

    Charlotte Faurie

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Rickard, I.J. (2016). The Developmental Origins of Health and Disease: Adaptation Reconsidered. In: Alvergne, A., Jenkinson, C., Faurie, C. (eds) Evolutionary Thinking in Medicine. Advances in the Evolutionary Analysis of Human Behaviour. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-29716-3_6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-29716-3_6

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