The socio-sexual environment and social group choice by males

在种群中，个体动物（包括人类）在行为和繁殖成功方面存在不同程度的差异。这种变异是选择作用所必需的，因而也是进化所必需的。尽管最近的进展，许多工作仍然要阐明的机制产生和维持生物性状变异，后者的选择和进化过程的后果。为了迎接这一挑战，我的研究计划探讨如何以及在何种程度上个体动物之间的社会协会结构的社会，反过来，社会环境如何影响他们的行为。社会介导的行为决定可以影响群体内的社会和性选择以及进化动态。

Within populations, individual animals (including humans) differ to varying degrees in their behaviour and reproductive success. Such variation is necessary for the action of selection and thus evolution. Despite recent advances, much work remains to elucidate the mechanisms generating and maintaining biological trait variation, and the consequences of the latter for the processes of selection and evolution. Towards meeting this challenge, my research programme explores how and to what extent social associations among individual animals structures their societies and, in turn, how the social environment influences their behaviour. Socially-mediated behavioural decisions can affect social and sexual selection and evolutionary dynamics within populations.