The evolution of sexual imprinting in socially monogamous populations

Sexual imprinting is a common mechanism of mate preference learning. It is thought to influence how traits evolve and in some cases to promote speciation. Recently there has been increasing interest in how sexual imprinting itself evolves. Theoretical work on polygynous mating systems predicts that females will evolve paternal imprinting, which means they learn to prefer phenotypes expressed by their fathers. In nature however, females of some species learn to prefer phenotypes expressed by their mothers instead. We used a dynamical systems model and tools from adaptive dynamics to study how sexual imprinting evolves in species with socially monogamous mating systems. We considered cases in which the target trait for imprinting is under viability selection but is not a reliable signal of paternal investment. Thus, the target trait signals the genetic benefits rather than the parental care benefits of mate choice. When mating is socially monogamous and there is some extra-pair paternity, we show that maternal imprinting can be favored over paternal imprinting. Counterintuitively, females often become choosier when selecting social partners in systems where extra-pair mating is more frequent. That is, females may be more selective when choosing social partners that will sire a smaller percentage of their offspring. Our results offer new testable hypotheses, and advance our understanding of the mechanisms that drive the evolution of mate choice strategies in nature.