Randolph M. Nesse

Education and career

Nesse studied at Carleton College from 1966 to 1970. He went on to receive his M.D. at the University of Michigan Medical School in 1974 and carried out his medical residency at the same place. Nesse became an instructor in psychiatry at the University of Michigan in 1977 and became an assistant professor there in psychiatry in 1979. He became associate professor in psychiatry in 1985 and professor in psychiatry in 1993 at University of Michigan, where he was also a professor of psychology since 2001. Nesse became professor emeritus at Michigan at the end of 2013.

Since 2014, Nesse became professor of life sciences and ASU Foundation Professor at Arizona State University, where he became the Founding Director of the Center for Evolution and Medicine. He was previously a professor of psychiatry, professor of psychology and research professor at the University of Michigan where he led the Evolution and Human Adaptation Program and helped to establish one of the world's first anxiety disorders clinics and conducted research on neuroendocrine responses to fear.

Research

Nesse's research on the evolution of aging led to a long collaboration with the evolutionary biologist George C. Williams. Their co-authored book, Why We Get Sick: The New Science of Darwinian Medicine, inspired fast growth of the field of evolutionary medicine. His subsequent research has focused on how natural selection shapes mechanisms that regulate pain, fever, anxiety, low mood, and why emotional disorders are so common. He also has written extensively about the evolutionary origins of moral emotions, and strategies for establishing evolutionary biology as a basic science for medicine. Good Reasons for Bad Feelings: Insights from the Frontier of Evolutionary Psychiatry applies the principles of evolutionary medicine to mental disorders.

Nesse was the initial organizer and second president of the Human Behavior and Evolution Society, and is currently the president of the International Society for Evolution, Medicine & Public Health. He is a Distinguished Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, and an elected Fellow of the AAAS.

Bibliography

Books and chapters

• Nesse, R. M., & Williams, G. C. (1995). Why We Get Sick. New York: Times Books.
• Nesse, R. M. (1999). "Testing evolutionary hypotheses about mental disorders." In S. Stearns (Ed.), Evolution in Health and Disease (pp. 260–266). New York: Oxford University Press.
• Nesse, R. M., & Williams, G. C. (1999). "Research designs that address evolutionary questions about medical disorders." In S. Stearns (Ed.), Evolution in Health and Disease (pp. 16–26). New York: Oxford University Press.
• "Is the market on Prozac?", February 28, 2000 Stanford University Press
• Nesse, Randolph M (Ed.). (2001). Evolution and the capacity for commitment. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
• Nesse, Randolph M, & Dawkins, R. (2010). Evolution: Medicine's most basic science. In D. A. Warrell, T. M. Cox, J. D. Firth, & E. J. J. Benz (Eds.), Oxford Textbook of Medicine, 5th edition (pp. 12–15). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Awards

2025 - Friend of Darwin award, National Center for Science Education

Papers

• {{citation |author=Nesse R |author2=Williams, G.C |author-link2=George C. Williams (biologist) |chapter=Are mental disorders diseases? |pages=1–22 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Isf50LBZjSUC&pg=PA1

References

References

1. "Randolph M. Nesse Quotes - 1 Science Quotes - Dictionary of Science Quotations and Scientist Quotes".
2. Quaglia, Sofia. "How Darwinism is changing medicine".
3. Nesse, Randolph M.. (2023). "Evolutionary psychiatry: foundations, progress and challenges". World Psychiatry.
4. "Randolph Nesse". University of Michigan.
5. "Randolph Nesse - CV".
6. Williams G. C., Nesse R. M.. (1991). "The dawn of Darwinian medicine". Quarterly Review of Biology.
7. Kingsland, Sharon. (1996-04-18). "Book Review Why We Get Sick: The New Science of Darwinian Medicine By Randolph M. Nesse and George C. Williams. 291 pp. New York, Times Books, 1995. $24. 0-8129-2224-7 (Published in England as Evolution and Healing: The New Science of Darwinian Medicine). Reinventing Darwin: The great debate at the high table of evolutionary theory By Niles Eldredge. 244 pp. New York, John Wiley, 1995. $27.95. 0-471-30301-1". New England Journal of Medicine.
8. Adams, Tim. (2019-03-17). "Good Reasons for Bad Feelings review – a new approach to mental disorder". The Observer.
9. "Friend of Darwin and Friend of the Planet awards for 2025". National Center for Science Education.