In their target article, Ko and Neuberg present a comprehensive framework highlighting the adaptive flexibility of the human mind in response to ecological affordances across the lifespan. In doing so, they primarily focus on ancestrally recurrent dimensions of the environment such as genetic relatedness and sex-age ratio. Nevertheless, they also suggest this framework can be extended to temporally novel environmental dimensions. For example, they propose that, even though toxic-waste dumps are ancestrally novel (i.e., a modern-day concept without an evolutionary precedent), the human mind can leverage evolved psychological mechanisms such as disgust to manage the ecological affordances (e.g., contamination risks) that toxic-waste dumps pose. Extending Ko and Neuberg’s proposed framework, we posit that some temporally novel environmental dimensions not only offer their own affordances but can also interact with other environmental dimensions to alter their affordances. To illustrate our point, we focus on a modern-day medical novelty – hormonal contraceptives (HCs).

Biologically, HCs decouple mating from reproduction by suppressing ovarian hormone production that regulates female fertility (Rivera, Yacobson, & Grimes, Reference Rivera, Yacobson and Grimes1999). Highlighting their broad reach, approximately 140 million women worldwide use HCs (Mørch et al., Reference Mørch, Skovlund, Hannaford, Iversen, Fielding and Lidegaard2017). Consistent with Ko and Neuberg’s proposed framework, HCs afford both males and females various opportunities and threats that change across life stages. During the childhood stage, for instance, females who use HCs produce fewer offspring whose births are spaced further apart (de Bocanegra et al., Reference de Bocanegra, Chang, Howell and Darney2014); by reducing sibling competition, such HC use affords those offspring greater caregiver investment and access to familial resources (Lawson & Mace, Reference Lawson and Mace2009). During the mating stage, because HCs permit delayed (and controlled) reproduction, they afford females who use them the opportunity to invest more heavily in their somatic growth and long-term mate selection, which may function to help them obtain higher-quality mates. For males, HCs pose a threat to their reproductive success by stifling their ability to reproduce quickly and often. Of course, because HCs enable females the freedom to adopt short-term mating strategies without unwanted reproductive consequences, HCs simultaneously afford males the opportunity to enact their preferred, short-term mating strategy, even if such strategies are less reproductively successful. During the parenting stage, when goals shift to relationship maintenance to facilitate biparental care that benefits offspring (Geary et al., Reference Geary2000), HCs afford both males and females the opportunity to nurture their pair bonds through sexual intimacy without pregnancy risk. Such increased sexual intimacy can benefit the dyad (e.g., Meltzer et al., Reference Meltzer, Makhanova, Hicks, French, McNulty and Bradbury2017) and enhance individual well-being (e.g., Robles et al., Reference Robles, Slatcher, Trombello and McGinn2014). Similar to Ko and Neuberg’s toxic-waste-dumps example, existing psychological mechanisms may help people manage some of those affordances that HCs pose.

Extending Ko and Neuberg’s framework of affordance management across life stages, we posit that novel environmental dimensions such as HCs may also alter the affordances posed by other environmental dimensions, which could vary across life stages. Drawing upon insights from the evolutionary mismatch hypothesis (Li, Van Vugt, & Colarelli, Reference Li, Van Vugt and Colarelli2018), ancestrally novel environmental dimensions can yield an adaptive lag – that is, certain novel environmental dimensions outpace the ability of our psychological mechanisms to adequately adapt. HCs qualify as an evolutionary mismatch because they disrupt some of the key psychological mechanisms underlying relationship formation and maintenance (French & Meltzer, Reference French and Meltzer2020; Li, Van Vugt, & Colarelli, Reference Li, Van Vugt and Colarelli2018). Crucially, HCs may also alter other environmental dimensions and their affordances that provide input to these same psychological mechanisms. Numerous testable predictions emerge from these ideas; empirical data support some of these ideas, whereas others are ripe for future research.

As just one example, by affording both males and females the freedom to adopt short-term mating strategies, widespread HC use could skew the operational sex ratio in favor of males (i.e., the less prevalent sex) – even when there are objectively fewer females in the environment. Indeed, during the mating stage, such a skew would functionally increase male mating opportunities, which may increase female risk-taking (Ackerman, Maner, & Carpenter, Reference Ackerman, Maner and Carpenter2016), intrasexual competition (Arnocky et al., Reference Arnocky, Ribout, Mirza and Knack2014; Moss & Maner, Reference Moss and Maner2016), and migration to enhance mating-pool prospects (e.g., Greenwood, Reference Greenwood1980; Pettay et al., Reference Pettay, Lummaa, Lynch and Loehr2021); such a skew may also reduce the likelihood of and delay marriage (e.g., South & Lloyd, Reference South and Lloyd1992). Providing preliminary evidence in support of these ideas, society-level data demonstrate that women residing in ecologies governed by greater (versus restricted) access to HCs are less likely to marry, and those who do marry do so later (Goldin & Katz, Reference Goldin and Katz2002). During the parenting stage in ecologies where HCs are widespread, a skewed sex ratio in favor of males that increases female short-term mating (Moss & Maner, Reference Moss and Maner2016) could increase partnered males’ risk of sexual infidelity. Of course, because HCs suppress reproduction, they may simultaneously afford males a reduced threat of cuckoldry (i.e., investing in another male’s offspring), which may effectively suppress the psychological mechanisms that typically respond to cues of heightened infidelity risk (e.g., presence of attractive rivals, low partner commitment). Consistent with these ideas, a study of different-sex married couples revealed that males who perceived their partners to be relatively less committed were more likely to engage in jealous behaviors, but only if their partners were not using HCs – males whose partners used HCs did not display this behavioral tendency (French, Meltzer, & Maner, Reference French, Meltzer and Maner2017).

In this commentary, we used HCs as an illustrative example of how environmental dimensions without evolutionary precedent can (a) generate novel affordances and (b) alter the affordances posed by other environmental dimensions. Crucially, however, this framework likely extends to other temporally novel environmental dimensions that are mismatched to ancestral environments. Given the unprecedented rapid pace of societal change and technological innovation, evolutionary mismatches abound. Dispersal of kin, media – particularly social media, and population density are additional examples of evolutionary mismatches (Li, Van Vugt, & Colarelli, Reference Li, Van Vugt and Colarelli2018) that likely interact with other environmental dimensions, altering their ecological affordances. Future research should investigate how these and other potential sources of evolutionary mismatch may alter ecological affordances across the lifespan.