LIFESCI 2D03 Chapter Notes - Chapter 13: Life History Theory, Paternal Care, Parental Investment
8 Feb 2016
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Parental care: behavior by a parent to enhance the fitness of offspring, including incubation, feeding and defense. Life history traits: traits involved with growth, reproduction, and survivorship. Animals vary quite a bit in their life history traits. Life history theory proposes that natural selection will favor the evolution of behaviors that maximize an individual"s lifetime reproductive success. Effort allocated to current offspring reduces effort allocated toward future offspring. Found species with larger body size had higher fecundity, later maturation, fewer reproductive events per year. Species with smaller body size showed the opposite. Species that invest more in individual offspring tent to also provide greater levels of parental care. Maternal care: parental care provided by a female to her offspring. Paternal care: parental care that a male provides to offspring. Biparental care: both parents provide care for offspring. Amphibians and reptiles usually provide little parental care. One sex typically provides most or all of the parental care, often the female.
