Abstract
Danger is a fundamental aspect of the lives of most animals. Adaptive behavior therefore requires avoiding actions, objects, and environments associated with danger. Previous research has shown that humans and non-human animals can avoid such dangers through two types of behavioral adaptions, (i) genetic preparedness to avoid certain stimuli or actions, and (ii) social learning. These adaptive mechanisms reduce the fitness costs associated with danger but still allow flexible behavior. Despite the empirical prevalence and importance of both these mechanisms, it is unclear when they evolve and how they interact. We used evolutionary agent-based simulations, incorporating empirically based learning mechanisms, to clarify if preparedness and social learning typically both evolve in dangerous environments, and if these mechanisms generally interact synergistically or antagonistically. Our simulations showed that preparedness and social learning often co-evolve because they provide complimentary benefits: genetic preparedness reduced foraging efficiency, but resulted in a higher rate of survival in dangerous environments, while social learning generally came to dominate the population, especially when the environment was stochastic. However, even in this case, genetic preparedness reliably evolved. Broadly, our results indicate that the relationship between preparedness and social learning is important as it can result in trade-offs between behavioral flexibility and safety, which can lead to seemingly suboptimal behavior if the evolutionary environment of the organism is not taken into account.
Highlights
Danger is a fundamental aspect of the lives of most animals
We asked how two contrasting cost-reducing adaptions, genetic preparedness and social learning, co-evolve and interact in dangerous environments. We examined if both preparedness and social learning typically evolve in dangerous environments, and found that this was the case
The reason for this joint evolution was that these adaptations provided complimentary benefits: our simulations show that genetic preparedness generally reduce foraging efficiency, but result in a higher rate of survival in dangerous environments, reflecting a trade-off between behavioral flexibility and safety
Summary
Danger is a fundamental aspect of the lives of most animals. A key dimension of adaptive behavior is to avoid actions, objects, and environments associated with danger. We investigated the interaction of two such cost-reducing behavioral adaptions through evolutionary agent-based modeling, (i) genetic coding of preferences (preparedness) and (ii) social learning. Experiments using experimental evolution have shown that animals (Drosophila flies) can acquire genetic, innate tendencies for both avoidance of an aversive, fitness-detrimental stimulus [23,24] and approach of a reward-related fitness-beneficial stimulus [25] in less than 40 generations, highlighting the fact that preparedness might evolve rapidly given sufficient selective pressure. Together, such findings suggest that many species likely have some. Social learning can thereby be seen as an exaptation, which uses pre-existing learning mechanisms, evolved for individual learning
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