Events

Executive Committee meetings

• 12 March 2024 - agenda and minutes
• 5 December 2023 - agenda and minutes
• 18 April 2023 – agenda and minutes
• 17 January 2023 – minutes
• 20 September 2022 – agenda and minutes
• 11 January 2022 – minutes
• 7 September 2021 – minutes
• 12 January 2021 – minutes
• 11 January 2021 – minutes
• 18 May 2016 – agenda and minutes
• 12 January 2016 – minutes (inaugural meeting)

Annual General Meetings

• 8 September 2023 - agenda and minutes
• 11 June 2021 – AGM minutes
• 31 May 2019 – AGM minutes
• 18 May 2018 – AGM minutes
• 13 January 2017 – agenda and minutes

Future events

• Friday 22 November 2024 – 6th International EPSIG Symposium. More details to be announced soon. The event information and booking link will be listed on the College's events page, here.
  

Joint event with the Philosophy SIG: an afternoon with Dr Iain McGilchrist 

Friday 5 April 2024 

EPSIG Trainee Workshop

Friday 1 March 2024 – Trainee Workshop. 

EPSIG AGM and Webinar Lecture by Derek Tracy

EPSIG International Symposium

The Evolutionary Psychiatry Special Interest Group 5th International Symposium was held at Prescot Street on Friday 10 March 2023. 

Evolutionary Psychiatry (EP) Workshop

27 January 2023 – 10am-5pm

RCPsych, 21 Prescot Street, London

We held a one-day face-to-face workshop on Evolutionary Psychiatry (EP) at the College in London on 27 January 2023 aimed at interested trainees within the UK as part of the EPSIG trainee engagement programme.

Evolutionary Psychiatry SIG Annual Conference

29 October 2021 – 9am-5pm

Online via Zoom

The Executive Committee of the Evolutionary Psychiatry Special Interest Group are delighted to announce that the 4th International Evolutionary Psychiatry Symposium due to take place on 29 October 2021 via Zoom is now open for registration. The symposium features a line-up 6 keynote speakers who are leading evolutionary thinkers and authors representing a wide diversity of disciplines and backgrounds. We hope that you will join us for this landmark evolutionary psychiatry event.

The Darwinian Roots of Attachment Theory – Half day webinar

19 March 2021 – 1.30-4.30pm

Please see programme from the day and you can view a recording of the event in your own time. Presentations are below:

• Annie Swanepoel – Understanding child development form an evolutionary perspective
• Martin Brune – Adult attachment and life history patterns in people with borderline personality disorder
• Jeremy Holmes – Bowlby, Darwin and group selection: a free energy neuroscience perspective
  

Presentations from EPSIG AGM and Evolutionary Perspectives on Suicide Workshop, London

31 May 2019

Please see the programme for the day.

• Mohammed Abbas – An Introduction to Suicide : Facts, Challenges and a Model (PPT)
• C A Soper- Adaptation to the Suicide Niche

Presentations from the Third EPSIG Symposium, London

22 March 2019

• Dr Gerhard Medicus – Human ethology and the understanding of personality disorder
• Dr Haley Peckham – Surviving at the cost of suffering: The mixed blessings of our evolved neuroplastic brains
• Bernadette Wren – Can evolutionary thinking shed light on gender diversity: A view from the clinic
• Professor Markus Rantala – An evolutionary model of depression
• Professor Daniel Nettle- Depression: What (if anything) is it, and what are its evolutionary origins
• Professor Marco Del Giudice – Form follows function: An evolutionary model of the structure of psychopathology

Recordings of these lectures can be viewed on our YouTube channel

Presentations from the 2nd EPSIG Symposium

12 January 2018

Live recordings from the symposium are now available on our YouTube channel or through the links below.

• Welcome Address from the EPSIG Chair
• How evolutionary thinking can help us to understand ADHD
• An Evolutionary Account of Brain Laterality
• Life History Theory: A Framework for the Understanding of Personality Disorder
• From caring to compassion: an evolutionary journey and social implication exploration
• Evolutionary Models of Mental Disorders (II) Eating Disorders
• What clinicians can learn from evolutionary psychiatry

Presentations from the 2nd EPSIG Half-day Scientific Meeting

18 May 2018

• Evolutionary aspects of ageing and Alzheimer’s – Paul St John-Smith
• Mental illness in hunter-gatherers: Child care and mismatch – Nikhil Chaudhary.

Download the full programme.

Presentations from the EPSIG Half-day Scientific Meeting

19 May 2017

• Professor Carmine Pariante – Depression and Inflammation: A Life-Saving Response to Stress Gone Awry
• Meeting Agenda 19th May.

Presentations from EPSIG AGM

January 2017

• Darwinian Theory and Psychiatry: a Historical Perspective presented by Hannah Sheftel.

Presentations from the first EPSIG Symposium

• Flyer – The First Symposium on Evolutionary Psychiatry
• 7 videos from the first EPSIG Symposium
• Why should Psychiatry now consider Evolution
• The Evolution of the Social Mind
• The Outgroup Intolerance Hypothesis for Schizophrenia
• Why We Get Sad: How Evolution Makes Sense of Emotional Disorders
• Autism: An evolutionary perspective
• The case for including evolutionary theory into the MRCPsych Curriculum.

Charles Darwin RCPsych Evolutionary Psychiatry SIG prize