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Related Concept Videos

Mate Choice

Mate Choice

Mate choice—the decision about whom to mate with—is a type of natural selection, since animals must reproduce to pass down their genes. Mate choice is also called intersexual selection because the behavior occurs between the sexes.

Types of Selection

Types of Selection

Natural selection influences the frequencies of particular alleles and phenotypes within populations in several different ways. Primarily, natural selection can be directional, stabilizing, or disruptive. Directional selection favors one extreme trait and shifts the population towards that phenotype while selecting against individuals displaying alternate traits. Stabilizing selection favors an intermediate trait with a narrow range of variation. Deviation from the optimal phenotype towards an...

What is Natural Selection?

What is Natural Selection?

Natural selection is an evolutionary process in which individuals with survival-promoting traits reproduce at higher rates. These favorable traits become more common within a population or species. Naturally selected traits initially arise via random genetic mutations. In order for selection to occur, there must be variation within a population, the trait controlling the variation must be heritable, and there must be an evolutionary advantage for variation in the trait.

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Predator-Prey Interactions

Predators consume prey for energy. Predators that acquire prey and prey that avoid predation both increase their chances of survival and reproduction (i.e., fitness). Routine predator-prey interactions elicit mutual adaptations that improve predator offenses, such as claws, teeth, and speed, as well as prey defenses, including crypsis, aposematism, and mimicry. Thus, predator-prey interactions resemble an evolutionary arms race.

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Conservation of declining population focuses on ways of detecting, diagnosing, and halting a population decline. The approach uses methods to prevent populations from going extinct.

Frequency-dependent Selection

Frequency-dependent Selection

When the fitness of a trait is influenced by how common it is (i.e., its frequency) relative to different traits within a population, this is referred to as frequency-dependent selection. Frequency-dependent selection may occur between species or within a single species. This type of selection can either be positive—with more common phenotypes having higher fitness—or negative, with rarer phenotypes conferring increased fitness.

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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jun 7, 2025

Probing the Limits of Egg Recognition Using Egg Rejection Experiments Along Phenotypic Gradients

Probing the Limits of Egg Recognition Using Egg Rejection Experiments Along Phenotypic Gradients

Published on: August 22, 2018

Immigrant birds learn from socially observed differences in payoffs when their environment changes.

Michael Chimento^1,2,3, Gustavo Alarcón-Nieto^3,4,5,6, Lucy M Aplin^1,2,3,7

¹Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.

|November 14, 2024

Summary

Great tits adjust their social learning strategies based on environmental variability. They use social information more when migrating to new, different habitats, demonstrating adaptive decision-making.

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Area of Science:

Behavioral Ecology
Animal Cognition
Evolutionary Biology

Background:

Strategic flexibility in social information use is theorized to aid adaptive decision-making in variable environments.
Previous studies demonstrated increased social information reliance in primates during environmental shifts, but data from other taxa are limited.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate if migration between spatially variable environments influences social information use in wild great tits (Parus major).
To test the hypothesis that environmental variability drives the evolution of social learning strategies.

Main Methods:

Conducted a large-scale cultural diffusion experiment with captive wild great tits.
Simulated immigration by exchanging knowledgeable birds between groups with differing foraging preferences and environments (similar vs. different).
Analyzed social learning strategies, including payoff-biased learning and individual learning, in response to environmental changes.

Main Results:

Both immigrant and resident great tits utilized social information and observed others' rewards.
Immigrants employed payoff-biased social learning when resources and habitat features were spatially variable.
Immigrants shifted to individual learning when payoffs or the environment remained unchanged.

Conclusions:

Great tits assess observed payoffs and are more influenced by social information when environmental cues differ in a new habitat.
Spatial environmental variability is a significant factor promoting the evolution of social learning strategies in birds.