Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 6, 2026

Conditions Affecting Social Space in Drosophila melanogaster
Published on: November 5, 2015
Exploring the Link between Genetic Relatedness r and Social Contact Structure k in Animal Social Networks
Jochen B W Wolf1, Arne Traulsen, Richard James
1Department of Evolutionary Genetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology, 24306 Plön, Germany. jochen.wolf@ebc.uu.se
Abstract:
Our understanding of how cooperation can arise in a population of selfish individuals has been greatly advanced by theory. More than one approach has been used to explore the effect of population structure. Inclusive fitness theory uses genetic relatedness r to express the role of population structure. Evolutionary graph theory models the evolution of cooperation on network structures and focuses on the number of interacting partners k as a quantity of interest. Here we use empirical data from a hierarchically structured animal contact network to examine the interplay between independent, measurable proxies for these key parameters. We find strong inverse correlations between estimates of r and k over three levels of social organization, suggesting that genetic relatedness and social contact structure capture similar structural information in a real population.
Related Concept Videos
Inclusive Fitness
Causes of Social Behavior III: Biological and Environmental Influences
Relationship Formation
Social Loafing
Gene Flow
Evolutionary Relationships through Genome Comparisons

