Evolution as the origin of hypotheses about human behaviour

Why do people exhibit social behaviour and what explains the evolution of such behaviour? It is a subject that has occupied Matthijs van Veelen for many years now. In his area of research, there is an important role for evolutionary game theory. Van Veelen talks about how the theory works and how he is trying to find a scientific explanation for altruism and similar phenomena. Human beings display a number of features that are unique to them and not found in any other animal species. 'We have the ability to speak and excel at theory-of-mind tasks. This means we're able to put ourselves into someone else's shoes. We're also very good at maths as well as obsessed by justice. That makes us unique among animal species,' says Dr Matthijs van Veelen, a professor at UvA's Amsterdam School of Economics (ASE). The evolution of altruism and the evolution of our obsession with justice are topics he has been studying for many years. 'We're not simple grazers, each doing our own thing independently of the others. We're a technological species. We're hunters who use tools and we're clever, knowledge-intensive gatherers. And many of the things we do, we do together. Evolutionary game theory versus classical game theory . Evolutionary game theory constitutes an important tool in Van Veelen's research. He defines the concept of game theory succinctly as follows: 'It's a mathematical description of strategic behaviour.' Classical game theory might be familiar to people through games such as the prisoner's dilemma. So what's the difference between the evolutionary and classical versions of game theory?