Is there indirect selection on female extra-pair reproduction through cross-sex genetic correlations with male reproductive fitness?
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Abstract One key hypothesis explaining the evolution and persistence of polyandry, and resulting female extra-pair reproduction in socially monogamous systems, is that female propensity for extra-pair reproduction is positively genetically correlated with male reproductive fitness and consequently experiences positive cross-sex indirect selection. However, key genetic correlations have rarely been estimated, especially in free-living populations experiencing natural (co)variation in reproductive strategies and fitness. We used long-term life-history and pedigree data from song sparrows (Melospiza melodia) to estimate the cross-sex genetic correlation between female propensity for extra-pair reproduction and adult male lifetime reproductive success, and thereby test a key hypothesis regarding mating system evolution. There was substantial additive genetic variance in both traits, providing substantial potential for indirect selection on female reproductive strategy. However, the cross-sex genetic correlation was estimated to be close to zero. Such small correlations might arise because male reproductive success achieved through extra-pair paternity was strongly positively genetically correlated with success achieved through within-pair paternity, implying that the same successful males commonly sire offspring produced by polyandrous and monogamous females. Cross-sex indirect selection may consequently have limited capacity to drive evolution of female extra-pair reproduction, or hence underlying polyandry, in systems where multiple routes to paternity success exist.
Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.
How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.003 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.003 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".