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On the Equivalence of Maximizing Reproductive Value and Maximizing Fitness
Author(s) -
Caswell Hal
Publication year - 1980
Publication title -
ecology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.144
H-Index - 294
eISSN - 1939-9170
pISSN - 0012-9658
DOI - 10.2307/1937149
Subject(s) - reproductive value , equivalence (formal languages) , maximization , fecundity , value (mathematics) , reproductive success , mathematics , set (abstract data type) , ecology , mathematical economics , biology , statistics , mathematical optimization , demography , computer science , population , discrete mathematics , pregnancy , genetics , sociology , offspring , programming language
It is commonly accepted that a life history which maximizes mean fitness also maximizes the reproductive value of each age class. By deriving explicit formulae for the derivatives of fitness and of reproductive value, I show that this equivalence can hold only under a very special set of conditions relating survival and fecundity at different ages. These conditions are neither intuitively obvious nor supported by the data available at this time. This suggests that the applicability of theory based on reproductive value maximization may be limited.