Research

I am a biological anthropologist specializing in biomedical and biocultural approaches. My research focus is evolutionary insights about human biology and behavior. My doctoral and post-doctoral research was on the causes of heritable mental illness and indigenous drug use/addiction in the Western Pacific. In addition to considering the relative risk of context vs genetic vulnerability as causes of mental illness (e.g. heritability vs social stressors, economic factors, cultural factors), the project addressed questions about whether people with mental illness and behavioral disorders self-medicate using drugs. My initial interest in indigenous drug use has developed into long term research of the evolution of human drug use (or more specifically, how the toxic chemical defenses used by plants have co-evolved with humans and other animals).                              

Education

Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Global Health Studies Program, University of Iowa (2002).
Ph.D. in Anthropology, University of Auckland, New Zealand (2001).
Doctoral exchange student, University of California, Santa Barbara (2000).
M.A. in Anthropology (first class honors), University of Auckland, New Zealand (1997).
B.A. in Anthropology, University of Auckland, New Zealand (1995).

Courses That I Teach

ANTH 001 Introduction to Biological Anthropology
ANTH 153 Evolutionary Medicine
ANTH 155 Fundamentals of Biological Anthropology
ANTH 156 Evolution of Human Behavior
ANTH 157 Human Variation
ANTH 187 Health Research in Biological Anthropology (lab)
ANTH 202 Biological Anthropology Seminar

Publications

Dr Sullivan's Google Scholar Profile

Sullivan RJ, Hagen EH (n.d.) Substance abuse: An evolutionary perspective of reward and motivation principles. In: Brüne M, Diederich N, Amunts K, Goetz C. The Evolutionary Roots of Human Brain Diseases. Oxford University Press.

Hagen EH, Blackwell AD, Lightner AD, Sullivan RJ (2023). Homo medicus: The transition to meat eating increased pathogen pressure and the use of pharmacological plants in Homo. American Journal of Biological Anthropology 180: 589–617. doi:10.1002/ajpa.24718

Hagen EH, Sullivan RJ. (2019). The evolutionary significance of drug toxicity over reward. In: Pickard H, & Ahmed S. Routledge Handbook of Philosophy and Science of Addiction. Routledge, New York. doi:10.4324/9781315689197-10

Anderson P, Berridge V, Conrod P, Dudley R, Hellman M, Lachenmeier D, Lingford-Hughes A, Miller D, Rehm J, Room R, Schmidt L, Sullivan R, Ysa T, Gual A. (2017). Reframing the science and policy of nicotine, illegal drugs and alcohol – conclusions of the ALICE RAP Project. F1000Research 2017, 6:289 doi:10.12688/f1000research.10860.1

Hagen EH, Garfield M, Sullivan RJ. (2016). The low prevalence of female smoking in the developing world: gender inequality or fetal protection? Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health 1: 195-211. doi.org/10.1093/emph/eow013

Sullivan RJ, Hagen EH. (2015). Passive vulnerability or active agency? An evolutionary and ecological perspective of human drug use. In: Anderson P, Rehm J, & Room R. The Impact of Addictive Substances and Behaviours on Individual and Societal Wellbeing. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pp. 13-36. doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198714002.003.0002

Roulette CJ, Mann H, Kemp BM, Remiker M, Roulette JW, Hewlett BS, Kazanji M, Breurec S, Monchy D, Sullivan RJ, Hagen EH. (2014). Tobacco use vs. helminths in Congo basin hunter-gatherers: self-medication in humans? Evolution and Human Behavior 35: 5, 397–407. doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2014.05.005

Hagen EH, Roulette CJ, Sullivan RJ. (2013). Explaining human recreational use of ‘pesticides’: the neurotoxin regulation model of substance use vs. the hijack model and implications for age and sex differences in drug consumption. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 4: 142. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2013.00142

Brüne M, Belsky J, Fabrega H, Feierman JR, Gilbert P, Glantz K, Polimeni J, Price JS, Sanjuan J, Sullivan R, Troisi A, Wilson DR (2012). The crisis of psychiatry – insights and prospects from evolutionary theory. World Psychiatry, 11:1, 55-57. doi: 10.1016/j.wpsyc.2012.01.009

Lyle HF, Sullivan RJ (2010). Cognitive adaptation and collective action: The P2P file sharing phenomenon. In N Kock (ed) Evolutionary Psychology and Information Systems Research: A New Approach to Studying the Effects of Modern Technologies on Human Behavior: pp. 169-191. Springer. doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-6139-6_8

Sorensen-Forbey JS, Harvey A, Huffman M, Provenza F, Sullivan RJ, Tasdemir D (2009). Exploitation of secondary metabolites by animals: A response to homeostatic challenges. Integrative and Comparative Biology, 49: 3, 314-328. doi.org/10.1093/icb/icp046

Schmidt R, Morris G, Hagen EH, Sullivan RJ, P Hammerstein, Kempter R (2009). The dopamine puzzle. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 106: 27, E75. doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0905153106

Lyle HF, Smith EA, Sullivan RJ (2009). Why do donors share? Blood donations as costly signals of donor quality. Journal of Evolutionary Psychology, 7:4, 263-286. doi.org/10.1556/jep.7.2009.4.1

Hagen EH, Sullivan RJ, Schmidt R, Morris G, Kempter R, and P Hammerstein (2009). Ecology and neurobiology of toxin avoidance and the paradox of drug reward. Neuroscience, 160: 69-84. doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroscience.2009.01.077

Sullivan RJ, Hagen E, Hammerstein P (2008). Revealing the paradox of drug reward in human evolution. Proceedings of the Royal Society. Part B, 275: 1640, 1231–1241. doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2007.1673

Sullivan RJ, Allen JS, Nero KL (2007). Schizophrenia in Palau: A biocultural analysis. Current Anthropology, 48: 2, 189-213. doi.org/10.1086/510474

Sullivan RJ, Andres S, Otto C, Miles W, Kydd R (2007). The effects of an indigenous muscarinic drug, betel nut (Areca catechu), on the symptoms of schizophrenia: A longitudinal study in Palau, Micronesia. American Journal of Psychiatry, 164: 4, 670-673. doi.org/10.1176/ajp.2007.164.4.670

Lyle HF, Sullivan RJ (2007). Competitive status signaling in peer-to-peer file-sharing networks. Evolutionary Psychology, 5: 2, 363-382. doi: 10.1177/147470490700500210

Sullivan RJ, Allen JS (2004). Natural selection and schizophrenia. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 27: 6, 865-866. doi: 0.1017/S0140525X04330190

Sullivan RJ, Hagen EH (2002). Psychotropic substance-seeking: evolutionary pathology or adaptation? Addiction, 97: 4, 389-400. (special issue E. Hill & D Newlin eds. Evolutionary Psychobiological Approaches to Addiction). doi.org/10.1046/j.1360-0443.2002.00024.x

Sullivan RJ, Allen JS, Otto C, Tiobech J, Nero K (2000). The effects of chewing betel nut (Areca catechu) on the symptoms of people with schizophrenia in Palau, Micronesia. The British Journal of Psychiatry, 177: 174-178. doi.org/10.1192/bjp.177.2.174

Sullivan RJ, Allen JS (1999). Social deficits associated with schizophrenia defined in terms of interpersonal machiavellianism. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 99: 148-154. doi.org/10.1111/j.1600-0447.1999.tb07213.x

Graduate Students at Sac State

Henry Lyle MA (Spring 2006)
Thesis title: Unconditional reciprocity and peer-to-peer file sharing : a test of evolutionary hypotheses.

Serena Reynolds MA (Fall 2011)
Thesis title: "Abnormal behavior" or "mental illness"?: Investigating the continuity of profound social withdrawal exhibited by humans and chimpanzees.

Jordan Serin MA (Fall 2011)
Thesis title: Cross-cultural perceptions of natural food.

Hayley Mann MA (Fall 2013)
Thesis title: The highly polymorphic human cytochrome P450 (CYP) 2A6 gene: examining diversity and nicotine metabolism in a Central African foraging population.

Alesha Pettit MA (Spring 2015)
Thesis title: A fitness cost warning among nulliparous human females.

Chelsea Hart-Conner MA (Spring 2016)
Thesis title: Health research in a migrant farm worker population: a test of an evolutionary hygiene hypothesis.