Theoretical social evolution: predictions for fluctuating environments

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Behaviors that affect the fitness of both the actor and its neighbors are called 'social behaviors.' My long-term objective is to understand how ecology influences the evolution of social behavior using a mix of mathematical modeling and computer simulation. In the short-term I will focus on the evolution of 3 categories of social behavior, with the over-arching goal of predicting the impact of unpredictable environmental conditions that fluctuate in time and space. The first category of social behavior I will study involves ones related to cooperative-breeding systems. In these systems some individuals forgo breeding opportunities to help raise offspring produced by others. Key projects will explore how cooperative breeding acts like an insurance policy to see groups through difficult times. These projects will contribute to our understanding of how social complexity evolves, especially as the environment becomes more erratic.  The second category of behavior I will study involves ones related to offspring-to-parent signalling systems. In particular, I want to know why we see such tremendous variation in these systems, and about the role unpredictable environmental conditions play in shaping them. The answers I uncover will point us to the adaptive significance that underlies the many strange ways in which parents and offspring communicate. The third category I will study relates to sex allocation, i.e. the division of a parent's resources between its sons and daughters. Here, I will match predictions from well-known models of ideal theoretical scenarios with those from more realistic simulations, my goal being to make the former more useful in situations where social environments are in flux. I also propose to predict patterns of sex allocation when social groups vary with respect to heritable aspects of individual quality, and to investigate how sex allocation strategies might buffer against extinction. These final two projects are expected to impact abilities to conserve threatened vertebrate species. Together, the 3 categories of behavior capture critical times in an individual's life, beginning with interactions between the individual and its parent, and ending with the relationship between the individual and its own offspring. My program will, therefore, provide a comprehensive set of predictions about how behavior evolves in the face of uncertainty, and allow us to manage biodiversity more effectively. My track record of publication, as well as awards and honors received in the past 6 years, shows that I am well-positioned to carry out the proposed work successfully. Importantly, the proposed work is tightly linked to my plans for training highly-qualified personnel. Trainees at a various levels (from undergrad to postdoc) will be heavily involved in all aspects of my research. As evidenced by my past contributions, my trainees will acquire in-demand skills, and they will do so in an inclusive, diverse, and challenging setting.