Same-sex courtship behaviors in male-biased populations: evidence for the mistaken identity hypothesis

Macchiano, Anthony; Razik, Imran; Sagot, Maria

doi:10.1007/s10211-018-0293-8

“…SSB is often considered a result of mistaken identity [39][40][41] , as is suggested to account for about 80% of reported cases in arthropods 3 . Our model provides an evolutionary perspective on this mistaken identity hypothesis, suggesting that poor sex identification could actually occur as an optimal strategy.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Same-sex sexual behaviour and selection for indiscriminate mating

Lerch

¹

,

Servedio

²

2020

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The widespread presence of same-sex sexual behavior (SSB) has long been thought to pose an evolutionary conundrum 1-3 , as participants in SSB suffer the cost of failing to reproduce after expending the time and energy to find a mate. The potential for SSB to occur as part of an optimal strategy has received almost no attention, although indiscriminate sexual behavior may be the ancestral mode of sexual reproduction 4 . Here, we build a simple model of sexual reproduction and create a theoretical framework for the evolution of indiscriminate sexual behavior. We provide strong support for the hypothesis that SSB is likely maintained by selection for indiscriminate sexual behavior, by showing that indiscriminate mating is the optimal strategy under a wide range of conditions. Further, our model suggests that the conditions that most strongly favor indiscriminate mating were likely present at the origin of sexual behavior. These findings have implications not only for the evolutionary origins of SSB, but also for the evolution of discriminate sexual behavior across the animal kingdom.Empirical observations of same-sex sexual behavior (SSB; i.e., any attempted sexual activity between two or more members of the same sex) in animals are widespread, with evidence of SSB in mammals 5-9 , birds 10-14 , arthropods [15][16][17][18][19] , mollusks [20][21][22] , echinoderms [23][24][25] , and other animals [26][27][28][29][30] . Since SSB is traditionally thought to be deleterious, as same-sex matings require energy expenditure but cannot produce offspring, there has been much interest in understanding its origin and maintenance [1][2][3][4][5] . Despite this, there exists no strong theoretical foundation for understanding SSB (but see 31,32 ), resulting in a wide range of untested verbal arguments in the literature [1][2][3][4][5] .Recently, Monk et al. 4 challenged the longstanding perspective of SSB as a derived trait, arguing that rather than trying to understand its presence, a more salient question would be to .

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“…Perhaps the most intuitive evolutionary consequence that SSB could exert, at least among invertebrates, arises from its well-supported link to "mistaken identity" (Harari, Brockmann, & Landolt, 2000;Dukas, 2010;Bailey and French, 2012;Scharf and Martin, 2013;Macchiano, Razik, & Sagot, 2018). In mating systems characterised by scramble competition, individuals that court or attempt to mate with a member of the same sex may do so because they have mistaken them for a member of the opposite sex.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Testing the role of same-sex sexual behaviour in the evolution of alternative male reproductive phenotypes

Rayner

¹

,

Bailey

²

2019

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Male same-sex sexual behaviour (SSB), where males court or attempt to mate with other males, is common among animal taxa. Recent studies have examined its fitness costs and benefits in attempts to understand its evolutionary maintenance, but the evolutionary consequences of SSB are less commonly considered. One potential impact of SSB might be to facilitate the evolution of traits associated with less sexually dimorphic males, such as alternative reproductive tactics, by diverting costly aggression from other males. To test this, we capitalised on the recent rapid spread of a silent male morph of field cricket, Teleogryllus oceanicus, which is unable to produce characteristic male acoustic signals, benefits from satellite mating behaviour, and exhibits feminised appearance and cuticular hydrocarbon profiles. We tested the prediction that interactions involving these non-signalling, less sexually dimorphic male morphs would show heightened rates of SSB, which could reduce the strength of male-male competition and permit greater access to females. We found no evidence that SSB was more common in trials involving silent males. Instead, SSB was predicted by courtship of females presented during a pre-trial treatment. Our results provide evidence supporting the view that SSB represents a spillover of sexually selected courtship behaviour in a non-adaptive context, but do not support a strong role for SSB in the evolution of less ornamented males in this system.

show abstract

“…SSB is often considered a result of mistaken identity [39][40][41] , as is suggested to account for about 80% of reported cases in arthropods 3 . Our model provides an evolutionary perspective on this mistaken identity hypothesis, suggesting that poor sex identification could actually occur as an optimal strategy.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Same-sex sexual behavior and selection for indiscriminate mating

Lerch

¹

,

Servedio

²

2020

Preprint

0

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The widespread presence of same-sex sexual behavior (SSB) has long been thought to pose an evolutionary conundrum1-3, as participants in SSB suffer the cost of failing to reproduce after expending the time and energy to find a mate. The potential for SSB to occur as part of an optimal strategy has received almost no attention, although indiscriminate sexual behavior may be the ancestral mode of sexual reproduction4. Here, we build a simple model of sexual reproduction and create a theoretical framework for the evolution of indiscriminate sexual behavior. We provide strong support for the hypothesis that SSB is likely maintained by selection for indiscriminate sexual behavior, by showing that indiscriminate mating is the optimal strategy under a wide range of conditions. Further, our model suggests that the conditions that most strongly favor indiscriminate mating were likely present at the origin of sexual behavior. These findings have implications not only for the evolutionary origins of SSB, but also for the evolution of discriminate sexual behavior across the animal kingdom.

show abstract

Same-sex courtship behaviors in male-biased populations: evidence for the mistaken identity hypothesis

Cited by 10 publications

References 30 publications

Same-sex sexual behaviour and selection for indiscriminate mating

Same-sex sexual behaviour and selection for indiscriminate mating

Testing the role of same-sex sexual behaviour in the evolution of alternative male reproductive phenotypes

Same-sex sexual behavior and selection for indiscriminate mating

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