The social selection alternative to sexual selection

Roughgarden, Joan

doi:10.1098/rstb.2011.0282

Cited by 41 publications

(47 citation statements)

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“…Recent calls to replace sexual selection with a framework of social selection [19,37], however, use a very different definition than the one developed by Crook [32] and extended by West-Eberhard [33,34] and others here [23,24]. According to Roughgarden's fringe viewpoint (see [38]), which is further extended in this issue [25], social selection is a hypothesis to explain the 'adaptive function of choosing mates and other actions taken during reproductive social behaviour is to fashion the social infrastructure from which offspring emerge'. Although proposed as an alternative to sexual selection, this view of social selection deals with how social interactions between potential partners or among parents and offspring influence reproductive success.…”

Section: Social Competition In Femalesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Moreover, selection on secondary sexual characteristics is not explicitly considered in this alternative framework, and therefore it is more akin to mating system theory than to sexual selection theory [39]. Thus, this view of replacing sexual selection theory with social selection theory [25] contrasts sharply with the view that sexual selection should be considered a subset of social selection theory [23,24,32] because they employ different definitions for the same term.…”

Section: Social Competition In Femalesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Sexual and social competition: broadening perspectives by defining female roles

Rubenstein

2012

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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Males figured more prominently than females in Darwin's view of sexual selection. He considered female choice of secondary importance to male–male competition as a mechanism to explain the evolution of male ornaments and armaments. Fisher later demonstrated the importance of female choice in driving male trait evolution, but his ideas were largely ignored for decades. As sexual selection came to embrace the notions of parent–offspring and sexual conflict, and experimental tests of female choice showed promise, females began to feature more prominently in the framework of sexual selection theory. Recent debate over this theory has centred around the role of females, not only over the question of choice, but also over female–female competition. Whereas some have called for expanding the sexual selection framework to encompass all forms of female–female competition, others have called for subsuming sexual selection within a broader framework of social selection, or replacing it altogether. Still others have argued for linking sexual selection more clearly to other evolutionary theories such as kin selection. Rather than simply debating terminology, we must take a broader view of the general processes that lead to trait evolution in both sexes by clearly defining the roles that females play in the process, and by focusing on intra- and inter-sexual interactions in males and females.

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Section: Social Competition In Femalesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Social Competition In Femalesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sexual and social competition: broadening perspectives by defining female roles

Rubenstein

2012

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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“…Sexual selection studies mating behaviours as adaptations. The emerging field of social selection [81], despite protestations, is not a substitute for sexual selection, but rather a valuable expansion that studies how sexuality and mating behaviours take on expanded roles beyond simply procreation [64].…”

Section: Sexual Selectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why Darwin would have loved evolutionary game theory

Brown¹

2016

Proc. R. Soc. B.

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Humans have marvelled at the fit of form and function, the way organisms' traits seem remarkably suited to their lifestyles and ecologies. While natural selection provides the scientific basis for the fit of form and function, Darwin found certain adaptations vexing or particularly intriguing: sex ratios, sexual selection and altruism. The logic behind these adaptations resides in frequency-dependent selection where the value of a given heritable phenotype (i.e. strategy) to an individual depends upon the strategies of others. Game theory is a branch of mathematics that is uniquely suited to solving such puzzles. While game theoretic thinking enters into Darwin's arguments and those of evolutionists through much of the twentieth century, the tools of evolutionary game theory were not available to Darwin or most evolutionists until the 1970s, and its full scope has only unfolded in the last three decades. As a consequence, game theory is applied and appreciated rather spottily. Game theory not only applies to matrix games and social games, it also applies to speciation, macroevolution and perhaps even to cancer. I assert that life and natural selection are a game, and that game theory is the appropriate logic for framing and understanding adaptations. Its scope can include behaviours within species, state-dependent strategies (such as male, female and so much more), speciation and coevolution, and expands beyond microevolution to macroevolution. Game theory clarifies aspects of ecological and evolutionary stability in ways useful to understanding eco-evolutionary dynamics, niche construction and ecosystem engineering. In short, I would like to think that Darwin would have found game theory uniquely useful for his theory of natural selection. Let us see why this is so.

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“…; Goodnight ). Although social phenotypes of conspecifics contribute substantially to variance in individual fitness (Lyon and Montgomerie ; Roughgarden ), interactions in biological communities include those with heterospecifics. Thus, although selection analyses to date have quantified the influence of conspecific social phenotypes on variance in fitness, heterospecific social phenotypes also likely contribute to such variance, and thereby constitute a critical element affecting community structure and dynamics.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Specific social phenotypes are quantified from the expression of social traits, including behaviors, that have repercussions both in the context of cooperative and aggressive interactions among individuals (Goodnight et al 1992;Aspi et al 2003;Weinig et al 2007;Eldakar et al 2010;Goodnight 2013). Although social phenotypes of conspecifics contribute substantially to variance in individual fitness (Lyon and Montgomerie 2012;Roughgarden 2012), interactions in biological communities include those with heterospecifics. Thus, although selection analyses to date have quantified the influence of conspecific social phenotypes on variance in fitness, heterospecific social phenotypes also likely contribute to such variance, and thereby constitute a critical element affecting community structure and dynamics.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Social phenotype extended to communities: Expanded multilevel social selection analysis reveals fitness consequences of interspecific interactions

2015

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In social species, fitness consequences are associated with both individual and social phenotypes. Social selection analysis has quantified the contribution of conspecific social traits to individual fitness. There has been no attempt, however, to apply a social selection approach to quantify the fitness implications of heterospecific social phenotypes. Here, we propose a novel social selection based approach integrating the role of all social interactions at the community level. We extended multilevel selection analysis by including a term accounting for the group phenotype of heterospecifics. We analyzed nest activity as a model social trait common to two species, the lesser kestrel (Falco naumanni) and jackdaw (Corvus monedula), nesting in either single- or mixed-species colonies. By recording reproductive outcome as a measure of relative fitness, our results reveal an asymmetric system wherein only jackdaw breeding performance was affected by the activity phenotypes of both conspecific and heterospecific neighbors. Our model incorporating heterospecific social phenotypes is applicable to animal communities where interacting species share a common social trait, thus allowing an assessment of the selection pressure imposed by interspecific interactions in nature. Finally, we discuss the potential role of ecological limitations accounting for random or preferential assortments among interspecific social phenotypes, and the implications of such processes to community evolution.

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The social selection alternative to sexual selection

Cited by 41 publications

References 59 publications

Sexual and social competition: broadening perspectives by defining female roles

Sexual and social competition: broadening perspectives by defining female roles

Why Darwin would have loved evolutionary game theory

Social phenotype extended to communities: Expanded multilevel social selection analysis reveals fitness consequences of interspecific interactions

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