Open AccessAggression patterns and speciation.
Author(s) -
Eviatar Nevo,
Gideon Naftali,
Ruth Guttman
Publication year - 1975
Publication title -
proceedings of the national academy of sciences of the united states of america
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 5.011
H-Index - 771
eISSN - 1091-6490
pISSN - 0027-8424
DOI - 10.1073/pnas.72.8.3250
Subject(s) - interspecific competition , aggression , agonistic behaviour , biology , genetic algorithm , sympatric speciation , parapatric speciation , zoology , evolutionary biology , genetics , heterogametic sex , chromosome , ecology , psychology , developmental psychology , gene , genetic variation , gene flow
The evolutionary significance of interspecific aggression as a factor in speciation was tested among three chromosome forms of the actively speciating fossorial rodent Spalax ehrenbergi in Israel. Laboratory experiments testing intra- and interspecific aggression were conducted on 48 adult animals from 10 populations comprising three chromosome forms with 2n = 52, 58, and 60. Twelve agonistic, motivational-conflict, and territorial behavioral variables were recorded during 72 combats involving homo- and heter-ogametic encounters between opponents. Analysis of the data matrix was carried out by the nonmetric multivariate Smallest Space Analysis (SSA-II). The results indicate that (a) aggression patterns, involving agonistic conflict and territorial variables, are higher in heterogametic encounters than in homogametic ones; and (b) aggression is higher between contiguous chromosome forms (2n = 58-60, and 2n = 52-58) than between noncontiguous ones (2n = 52-60). Both a and b suggest that high interspecific aggression appears to be adaptively selected at final stages of speciation in mole rats as a premating isolating mechanism which reinforces species identification and establishes parapatric distributions between the evolving species.