Social Plasticity Enhances Signal-Preference Codivergence.

Area of Science:

• Ecology
• Evolutionary Biology
• Animal Behavior

Background:

• The social environment significantly influences animal fitness and adaptation.
• Social plasticity, the ability to adjust behavior based on social context, is crucial for navigating dynamic environments.
• Signal-preference divergence is a key factor in speciation, but difficult to test in natural systems.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate if social plasticity can promote signal-preference divergence in recently diverged treehopper species.
• To determine if interactions with heterospecifics enhance or reduce signal-preference differences.
• To test if social plasticity contributes to assortative mating and speciation.

Main Methods:

• Rearing two Enchenopa treehopper species in mixed-species versus own-species aggregations.
• Measuring vibrational signal characteristics and mate preferences.
• Comparing plastic responses between sympatric and allopatric populations.

Main Results:

• Exposure to heterospecifics in mixed-species aggregations enhanced signal-preference species differences.
• One species showed enhanced signal-preference divergence after social exposure.
• No evidence of reinforcement in signals or preferences was found between sympatric and allopatric sites.

Conclusions:

• Social plasticity, driven by heterospecific interactions, can create or enhance signal-preference divergence.
• This process may facilitate rapid diversification and speciation.
• Social plasticity can promote divergence even without direct selection against hybridization.