The offspring quantity-quality trade-off and human fertility variation.
The offspring quantity-quality trade-off and human fertility variation.
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DOI：
10.1098/rstb.2015.0145
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发表时间：
2016-04-19
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
Borgerhoff Mulder M
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Lawson DW;Borgerhoff Mulder M
长期以来，后代数量和质量之间的权衡决定了生殖行为，这一观点一直是生育经济学观点的核心。它在进化生态学中也有类似的更丰富的理论基础。我们回顾了数量-质量权衡概念在人类生殖中的应用，强调了产蛋数量和终生生育能力之间的区别，以及在像我们这样的无性繁殖和有性繁殖物种中，导致生育能力变化的更广泛的力量。然后我们认为，在接近人类进化史的环境中，有几个因素限制了代价高昂的兄弟姐妹竞争。因此，虽然数量-质量权衡的优化无疑塑造了人类生理学的进化，设定了繁殖的上限，但我们认为它在解释生育力的社会生态和个体差异方面发挥了适度的作用。只有在进入人口结构转型后，才能清楚地将生育限制解释为通过增加每个孩子的亲代投资来提高后代质量的战略导向，低生育率提高后代的社会经济成就，尽管不是生殖成功。我们的结论是，现有的经济和进化文献往往过分强调了数量-质量权衡对人类生育变化的中心作用，并主张发展更全面的框架，包括替代生活史权衡和指导其解决的进化机制。
The idea that trade-offs between offspring quantity and quality shape reproductive behaviour has long been central to economic perspectives on fertility. It also has a parallel and richer theoretical foundation in evolutionary ecology. We review the application of the quantity–quality trade-off concept to human reproduction, emphasizing distinctions between clutch size and lifetime fertility, and the wider set of forces contributing to fertility variation in iteroparous and sexually reproducing species like our own. We then argue that in settings approximating human evolutionary history, several factors limit costly sibling competition. Consequently, while the optimization of quantity–quality trade-offs undoubtedly shaped the evolution of human physiology setting the upper limits of reproduction, we argue it plays a modest role in accounting for socio-ecological and individual variation in fertility. Only upon entering the demographic transition can fertility limitation be clearly interpreted as strategically orientated to advancing offspring quality via increased parental investment per child, with low fertility increasing descendant socio-economic success, although not reproductive success. We conclude that existing economic and evolutionary literature has often overemphasized the centrality of quantity–quality trade-offs to human fertility variation and advocate for the development of more holistic frameworks encompassing alternative life-history trade-offs and the evolved mechanisms guiding their resolution.