The evolution of sport as a male spectator lek

Published 17 January, 2012

Corresponding author: Michael Lombardo
Email: lombardm@gvsu.edu

Allendale, MI. LeBron James’s decision to move from the Cleveland Cavaliers to the Miami Heat in 2010, Chicago Bears quarterback Jay Cutler sitting out much of his team’s loss to the Green Bay Packers during the 2011 National Football Conference Championship game, and Tim Tebow’s religious beliefs and exploits on the football field as quarterback for the Denver Broncos.

Why do these events make headline news next to coverage of national and global politics? Sports are so important in the lives of most men that they, collectively, spend billions of hours playing, watching, and discussing sports and billions of dollars on sports related activities.

Michael P. Lombardo, Professor of Biology at Grand Valley State University presents a biological theory of sport rooted in Darwin’s theories of evolution by natural and sexual selection.

Most historians of sport agree that sport began as a way for boys to develop the physical and mental attributes needed for success in primitive hunting and warfare. Today, sports retain some of their original training functions but Lombardo hypothesizes that sport has evolved to function like a non-human mating display arena, commonly called a lek, like those found in birds such as the sage grouse of the western USA, but with an important difference.

In typical mating display leks, males congregate in areas that do not contain resources used by breeding females and perform courtship displays observed by females that either directly choose with whom they will mate, or copy the mate choice of others. Lombardo hypothesizes that athletic contests function as “leks” where male physical prowess and the behaviors important in conflict and cooperation are displayed by athletes and evaluated primarily by male, not female, spectators.

The characteristics of historical and modern sports are consistent with the predictions of the male spectator lek hypothesis. Observations that champion male athletes in sports (e.g., American football, baseball, basketball, soccer) requiring the skills needed for success in fighting and primitive hunting and warfare obtain the most reproductive opportunities supports intersexual selection theories of sport. However, Lombardo’s analyses suggest that while male-male competition and female mate choice preferences both influenced the evolution of sport, the primary driving force shaping the characteristics of male sports and athletes was male-male competition.

These results help explain why many men continue to play sports into adulthood, travel long distances to view the Super Bowl, FIFA World Cup, and Olympics, spend hours each week in front of television watching sports, and care so much about whether LeBron James changes teams, Jay Cutler stood on the sidelines while his team lost, or Tim Tebow really lives his life by his religious beliefs.

“On the Evolution of Sport,” is published in Evolutionary Psychology and is available at: http://www.epjournal.net/articles/on-the-evolution-of-sport/