An official website of the United States government
Choosing a mate is perhaps the most important decision a sexually reproducing organism makes in its lifetime. And yet, psychologists lack a precise description of human mate choice, despite sustained attention from several theoretical perspectives. Here, I argue this limited progress owes to the complexity of mate choice and describe a new modeling approach, called “couple simulation,” designed to compare models of mate choice by challenging them to reproduce real couples within simulated mating markets. I present proof-of-concept simulations that demonstrate couple simulation can identify a population’s true model of mate choice. Furthermore, I apply couple simulation to two samples of real couples and find that the method (a) successfully reconstructs real-world couples, (b) discriminates between models of mate choice, and (c) predicts a wide range of dimensions of relationship quality. Collectively, these results provide evidence that couple simulation offers a framework useful for evaluating theories of human mate choice.
more »
« less
Mating with Multi-Armed Bandits: Reinforcement Learning Models of Human Mate Search
Abstract Mate choice requires navigating an exploration-exploitation trade-off. Successful mate choice requires choosing partners who have preferred qualities; but time spent determining one partner’s qualities could have been spent exploring for potentially superior alternatives. Here I argue that this dilemma can be modeled in a reinforcement learning framework as a multi-armed bandit problem. Moreover, using agent-based models and a sample of k = 522 real-world romantic dyads, I show that a reciprocity-weighted Thompson sampling algorithm performs well both in guiding mate search in noisy search environments and in reproducing the mate choices of real-world participants. These results provide a formal model of the understudied psychology of human mate search. They additionally offer implications for our understanding of person perception and mate choice.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 1845586
- PAR ID:
- 10614334
- Publisher / Repository:
- MIT Press
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Open Mind
- Volume:
- 8
- ISSN:
- 2470-2986
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 995 to 1011
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
ABSTRACT Female mate choice is a dynamic process that allows individuals to selectively mate with those of the opposite sex that display a preferred set of traits. Because in many species males compete with each other for fertilization opportunities, female mate choice can be a powerful agent of sexual selection, often resulting in highly conspicuous traits in males. Although the evolutionary causes and consequences of the ornamentation and behaviors displayed by males to attract mates have been well studied, embarrassingly little is known about the proximate neural mechanisms through which female choice occurs. In vertebrates, female mate choice is inherently a social behavior, and although much remains to be discovered about this process, recent evidence suggests the neural substrates and circuits underlying other fundamental social behaviors (such as pair bonding, aggression and parental care) are likely similarly recruited during mate choice. Notably, female mate choice is not static, as social and ecological environments can shape the brain and, consequently, behavior in specific ways. In this Review, we discuss how social and/or ecological influences mediate female choice and how this occurs within the brain. We then discuss our current understanding of the neural substrates underlying female mate choice, with a specific focus on those that also play a role in regulating other social behaviors. Finally, we propose several promising avenues for future research by highlighting novel model systems and new methodological approaches, which together will transform our understanding of the causes and consequences of female mate choice.more » « less
-
While male mate choice has received sparse attention in comparison to female choice, it occurs often in insects. In addition, male insects may preferentially allocate sperm and ejaculate in response to female quality. Previous research indicates that male Bicyclus anynana butterflies can learn mate preference through prior exposure to females, though naïve males mate randomly. It is unclear whether this preference learning may also influence male sperm and ejaculate allocation after mate selection, or whether males have cryptic mate preference for female wing patterns independent of preference learning. Here we test whether B. anynana males adjust their sperm and ejaculate allocation in response to a learned preference. We also assess whether males exhibit an innate cryptic preference and adjust their sperm and ejaculate in response to female wing pattern. We compared number of eggs laid by females and spermatophore (male butterfly ejaculate) weight in four no-choice treatments: naïve male butterflies (having no prior exposure to females), paired with a 2 or 0-spot female, and experienced male butterflies (having a previous three-hour interaction with a 0-spot female), paired with a 2 or 0-spot female. All females used were naturally 2-spot females, 0-spot females had artificially blocked spots. We found that 0-spot females laid significantly more eggs than 2-spot females, independent of male experience. There was no effect of female phenotype or male experience on spermatophore weight. Our findings suggest that male B. anynana have an innate cryptic preference for 0-spot females, which has been shown in other studies to only be seen as a pre-copulatory preference when enhanced by early experience.more » « less
-
AbstractWhile there are many studies documenting female mating preferences across taxa, male mate choice remains relatively understudied. Male mate choice often develops when there is variation in female quality and thus the fitness benefits of mating with particular females. Specifically, males tend to prefer females with traits that confer direct fitness benefits such as large body size, which may be linked with high fecundity. Prior work has shown that females of the strawberry poison frog,Oophaga pumilio, prefer males bearing certain coloration (most often the female’s own color), and that this preference can be learned through maternal imprinting. Females have been shown to prefer larger males as well. Here we test whether similar mate preferences for color and size exist in males of this species using two-way choice tests on captive bred maleO. pumilio. In each test focal males were placed in an arena with two stimulus females: either both of the same size but differing in color, or both of the same color but differing in size. We found only weak evidence for behavioral biases toward particular colors and no evidence for biases toward larger females, suggesting that males ofO. pumiliodo not predictably choose mates based on these female traits. Despite several aspects of their natural history that suggest males have reasons to be choosy, our findings suggest that the cost of mate rejection may outweigh any fitness benefits derived from being selective of mates. Studies of additional populations, ideally conducted on wild individuals, are needed to better understand the range of conditions under which males may exhibit mate choice and the types of traits on which they base these choices. Significance statementTo fully understand the fitness landscapes and evolutionary trajectories that result from sexual selection, we need to understand when and how the mate preferences of the two sexes act and interact. While female mate choice has been widely studied, male mate choice remains poorly understood. To help bridge this gap, we studied male mate preferences in the strawberry poison frogOophaga pumilio, a small brightly colored frog for which female preferences for male color and size have been well-documented. We found no evidence that maleO. pumilioexhibit mate preferences based on female size and little evidence for male mate preferences based on female color. This is surprising given that larger females are often more fecund, maleO. pumilioare known to exhibit color-based behavioral biases in the context of male-male competition, and both sexes provide parental care.more » « less
-
Abstract Competition for mates can play a critical role in determining reproductive success, shaping phenotypic variation within populations, and influencing divergence. Yet, studies of the role of sexual selection in divergence and speciation have focused disproportionately on mate choice. Here, we synthesize the literature on how mate competition may contribute to speciation and integrate concepts from work on sexual selection within populations—mating systems, ecology, and mate choice. Using this synthesis, we generate testable predictions for how mate competition may contribute to divergence. Then, we identify the extent of existing support for these predictions in the literature with a systematic review of the consequences of mate competition for population divergence across a range of evolutionary, ecological, and geographic contexts. We broadly evaluate current evidence, identify gaps in available data and hypotheses that need testing, and outline promising directions for future work. A major finding is that mate competition may commonly facilitate further divergence after initial divergence has occurred, e.g., upon secondary contact and between allopatric populations. Importantly, current hypotheses for how mate competition contributes to divergence do not fully explain observed patterns. While results from many studies fit predictions of negative frequency-dependent selection, agonistic character displacement, and ecological selection, results from ~30% of studies did not fit existing conceptual models. This review identifies future research aims for scenarios in which mate competition is likely important but has been understudied, including how ecological context and interactions between mate choice and mate competition can facilitate or hinder divergence and speciation.more » « less
- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
-
Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1162/opmi_a_00156
