Theoretical social evolution: predictions for fluctuating environments

影响参与者及其邻居健康的行为被称为“社会行为”。我的长期目标是通过数学建模和计算机模拟相结合的方式来理解生态如何影响社会行为的演变。在短期内，我将重点关注三类社会行为的演变，总体目标是预测在时间和空间上波动的不可预测环境条件的影响。我将研究的第一类社会行为涉及与合作繁殖系统有关的行为。在这些系统中，一些个体放弃了繁衍后代的机会，以帮助养育其他个体所生的后代。重点项目将探索合作养殖如何发挥保险单的作用，帮助群体度过困难时期。这些项目将有助于我们理解社会复杂性是如何演变的，特别是在环境变得更加不稳定的情况下。我将研究的第二类行为涉及与后代到父母的信号系统有关的行为。特别是，我想知道为什么我们在这些系统中看到如此巨大的差异，以及不可预测的环境条件在塑造这些系统中所起的作用。我发现的答案将让我们认识到，父母和子女之间许多奇怪的沟通方式背后存在着适应的重要性。我将研究的第三个类别与性别分配有关，即父母的资源在其子女之间的分配。在这里，我将把来自理想理论情景的著名模型的预测与来自更现实的模拟的预测进行匹配，我的目标是使前者在社会环境不断变化的情况下更有用。我还建议当社会群体在个人素质的可遗传方面存在差异时，预测性别分配的模式，并调查性别分配策略如何缓冲灭绝。最后两个项目预计将影响保护受威胁脊椎动物物种的能力。这三类行为一起捕捉了一个人生命中的关键时期，从个人与其父母之间的互动开始，以个人与其后代之间的关系结束。因此，我的计划将提供一套关于面对不确定性时行为如何演变的全面预测，并使我们能够更有效地管理生物多样性。我的出版记录，以及在过去6年中获得的奖项和荣誉，表明我有能力成功地完成拟议的工作。重要的是，拟议的工作与我培养高素质人才的计划密切相关。不同级别的实习生(从本科生到博士后)将深入参与我研究的方方面面。正如我过去的贡献所证明的那样，我的学员将获得按需技能，他们将在一个包容、多样化和具有挑战性的环境中做到这一点。

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.