Divergence of developmental trajectories is triggered interactively by early social and ecological experience in a cooperative breeder.

Fischer, Stefan; Bohn, Lena; Oberhummer, Evelyne; Nyman, Cecilia; Taborsky, Barbara (2017). Divergence of developmental trajectories is triggered interactively by early social and ecological experience in a cooperative breeder. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America - PNAS, 114(44), -. National Academy of Sciences 10.1073/pnas.1705934114

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Cooperative breeders feature the highest level of social complexity among vertebrates. Environmental constraints foster the evolution of this form of social organization, selecting for both well-developed social and ecological competences. Cooperative breeders pursue one of two alternative social trajectories: delaying reproduction to care for the offspring of dominant breeders or dispersing early to breed independently. It is yet unclear which ecological and social triggers determine the choice between these alternatives and whether diverging developmental trajectories exist in cooperative vertebrates predisposing them to dispersal or philopatry. Here we experimentally reared juveniles of cooperatively breeding cichlid fish by varying the social environment and simulated predation threat in a two-by-two factorial long-term experiment. First, we show that individuals develop specialized behavioral competences, originating already in the early postnatal phase. Second, these specializations predisposed individuals to pursue different developmental trajectories and either to disperse early or to extend philopatry in adulthood. Thus, our results contrast with the proposition that social specializations in early ontogeny should be restricted to eusocial species. Importantly, social and ecological triggers were both required for the generation of divergent life histories. Our results thus confirm recent predictions from theoretical models that organisms should combine relevant information from different environmental cues to develop integrated phenotypes.

Item Type:

Journal Article (Original Article)

Division/Institute:

08 Faculty of Science > Department of Biology > Institute of Ecology and Evolution (IEE)
08 Faculty of Science > Department of Biology > Institute of Ecology and Evolution (IEE) > Behavioural Ecology

UniBE Contributor:

Fischer, Stefan, Bohn, Lena, Oberhummer, Evelyne, Nyman, Cecilia Alexandra, Taborsky, Barbara

Subjects:

500 Science > 570 Life sciences; biology
500 Science > 590 Animals (Zoology)
000 Computer science, knowledge & systems

ISSN:

1091-6490

Publisher:

National Academy of Sciences

Language:

English

Submitter:

Anja Ebeling

Date Deposited:

17 Jul 2023 16:41

Last Modified:

18 Jul 2023 11:42

Publisher DOI:

10.1073/pnas.1705934114

PubMed ID:

29078289

Uncontrolled Keywords:

antipredator behavior cooperation developmental plasticity early-life effects social competence

BORIS DOI:

10.48350/184899

URI:

https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/184899

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