Competitive asymmetries, birthing asynchrony and sibling rivalry in a social lizard

IF 1.9 2区 生物学 Q3 BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES
Alix Bouffet-Halle, Erik Wapstra, Geoffrey M. While
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Abstract

Family life often involves interactions between individuals who have different fitness goals, leading to conflict. Resolution of this conflict is key for the stabilisation of family life. Here, we used a lizard, Liopholis whitii, that lives in facultative family groups to characterise the nature and extent of sibling conflict and test the role that individual and litter characteristics play in shaping conflict between family members. We found significant variation in conflict between family groups, specifically in relation to siblings. In approximately half of the litters, siblings were aggressive towards one another, while in the other half of litters, there was no aggression observed between siblings. There were no differences between aggressive and non-aggressive litters in the key factors predicted to mediate conflict, including sex, offspring size, or litter size. However, in aggressive litters, the maximum amount of within-litter conflict decreased with an increase in the spread between births of siblings. First-born offspring were significantly more likely to be aggressive towards their siblings compared to second and third born offspring. While one offspring was usually the target of that aggression, we found no evidence that any individual-level factor predicted who received aggression. In aggressive litters, aggressive offspring spent a greater amount of time with their mother compared to non-aggressive offspring. Similar asymmetries in the amount of time offspring spent with their mother between siblings were also observed in non-aggressive litters. Combined, our results suggest that birth order is the main driver of sibling conflict in aggressive litters in this facultatively social lizard species, suggesting that birthing asynchrony may provide females with a mechanism to manage conflict.

Significance statement

Conflict is a ubiquitous aspect of family life; it occurs between adults, between parents and offspring as well as between siblings. We show that the extent of conflict between siblings varies considerably within and between families in a lizard that exhibits prolonged associations between parents and offspring. We found no effects of offspring sex or size on within or between litter conflict. Instead, the number of days that passed between the birth of offspring appears to be the main factor that influences how much conflict there is between siblings. Furthermore, birth order was the main factor predicting which offspring was dominant. Combined this suggests that birthing asynchrony, the ability of females to spread out births across multiple days, may play a crucial role in the management of conflict in this system. As the moderation of conflict is crucial for the stabilisation of family life, these results provide important insights into the early evolution of social life.

Abstract Image

社会蜥蜴的竞争不对称、分娩不同步和同胞竞争
摘要家庭生活往往涉及具有不同健康目标的个人之间的互动,从而导致冲突。解决这种冲突是稳定家庭生活的关键。在这里,我们利用一种生活在面生家庭群体中的蜥蜴--Liopholis whitii--来描述兄弟姐妹冲突的性质和程度,并检验个体和窝的特征在形成家庭成员间冲突中所起的作用。我们发现,家庭群体之间的冲突差异很大,尤其是兄弟姐妹之间的冲突。在大约一半的幼仔中,兄弟姐妹之间具有攻击性,而在另一半幼仔中,兄弟姐妹之间没有攻击性。攻击性幼仔和非攻击性幼仔之间在性别、后代大小或幼仔大小等预计会调解冲突的关键因素上没有差异。然而,在攻击性窝中,窝内冲突的最大值随着兄弟姐妹出生间隔的增加而减少。与第二胎和第三胎的后代相比,第一胎的后代更有可能对其兄弟姐妹采取攻击性行为。虽然通常有一个后代是攻击的目标,但我们没有发现任何个体水平的因素能预测谁会受到攻击。在具有攻击性的幼仔中,与不具有攻击性的幼仔相比,具有攻击性的幼仔与母亲在一起的时间更长。在非攻击性幼仔中,也观察到同胞之间后代与母亲相处时间的类似不对称性。综上所述,我们的研究结果表明,出生顺序是这一表面社会性蜥蜴物种攻击性幼仔中兄弟姐妹冲突的主要驱动因素,这表明分娩不同步可能为雌性提供了一种管理冲突的机制。我们的研究表明,在一种父母与后代之间有长期联系的蜥蜴中,兄弟姐妹之间的冲突程度在家庭内部和家庭之间有很大的不同。我们发现,后代的性别或大小对同窝或同窝之间的冲突没有影响。相反,后代出生间隔天数似乎是影响兄弟姐妹间冲突程度的主要因素。此外,出生顺序也是预测哪个后代占优势的主要因素。综合这些因素,我们可以看出,在这个系统中,分娩不同步,即雌性在多天内分散分娩的能力,可能在冲突管理中起着至关重要的作用。由于冲突的缓和对家庭生活的稳定至关重要,这些结果为社会生活的早期演化提供了重要的启示。
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来源期刊
CiteScore
3.90
自引率
8.70%
发文量
146
审稿时长
3 months
期刊介绍: The journal publishes reviews, original contributions and commentaries dealing with quantitative empirical and theoretical studies in the analysis of animal behavior at the level of the individual, group, population, community, and species.
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