Carry-over effects of the social environment on future divorce probability in a wild bird population.

ABSTRACT: Initial mate choice and re-mating strategies (infidelity and divorce) influence individual fitness. Both of these should be influenced by the social environment, which determines the number and availability of potential partners. While most studies looking at this relationship take a population-level approach, individual-level responses to variation in the social environment remain largely unstudied. Here, we explore carry-over effects on future mating decisions of the social environment in which the initial mating decision occurred. Using detailed data on the winter social networks of great tits, we tested whether the probability of subsequent divorce, a year later, could be predicted by measures of the social environment at the time of pairing. We found that males that had a lower propor

SUBMITTER: Culina A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4633865 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature