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Behavioral Ecology Advance Access published online on February 12, 2009
Behavioral Ecology, doi:10.1093/beheco/arp015
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© The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Society for Behavioral Ecology. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Family conflict and the evolution of sociality in reptiles

Geoffrey M. Whilea, Tobias Ullerb and Erik Wapstraa

a School of Zoology, Private Bag 05, University of Tasmania, Tasmania, 7001 Australia b Tobias Uller, Edward Grey Institute, Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, OX1 3PS Oxford, UK

Address correspondence to G.M. While. E-mail: gwhile{at}utas.edu.au.


  Abstract

Mating systems and parental care are predicted to coevolve because the former dictates the cost–benefit ratio of the latter by affecting genetic relatedness between adults and offspring. Reptiles show only rudimentary forms of sociality and parental care and, hence, could provide important insights into the early stages of the evolution and maintenance of social systems. The skink genus Egernia exhibits the most complex form of sociality and parental care in lizards, with the formation of stable social groups typically consisting of a monogamous pair and their offspring. Here we show that, within a social group, offspring sired by males other than the social father are restricted to the area of the parental home range that is occupied exclusively by the mother. Thus, males rarely tolerate offspring within their home range that they are not genetically related to. This may increase the cost of multiple mating for females and offspring via increased risk of infanticide, reduced parental tolerance, and increased mother–offspring competition. We outline a verbal model for how this could generate a feedback loop in which selection favors reduced multiple mating by females and increased paternal care, thereby setting the stage for the evolution of complex sociality and genetic monogamy.

Key words: Egernia whitii, mating systems, parental care, paternity, sociality.

Received 11 July 2008; revised 27 November 2008; accepted 29 December 2008.


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G. M. While, D. L. Sinn, and E. Wapstra
Female aggression predicts mode of paternity acquisition in a social lizard
Proc R Soc B, June 7, 2009; 276(1664): 2021 - 2029.
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