Mate Choice and Intrasexual Reproductive Competition: Contributions to Reproduction That Go Beyond Acquiring More Mates

Abstract

How do mate choice and reproductive competition contribute to the greater success of some individuals relative to others in producing surviving young or fertilized gametes? Within evolutionary biology, the answer to this question has traditionally been sought in the salutary effects of mate choice and reproductive competition on an individual’s fecundity through its ability to obtain more mates. Consequently, these traits have been closely associated in evolutionary biology with the process that Darwin (1871) termed “sexual selection.” As a corollary, they have received little evaluation with respect to other potential selective advantages, as through natural selection. But why consider only more mates? Why not better quality mates? And what aspects of quality differences might competition and choice be based on? Only quality with respect to fertility, or might quality with respect to promoting offspring survival also be a basis for mate choice? Questioning traditional closure as premature, this chapter first examines the origins of the narrowed focus and then presents bases for taking a more holistic approach to the evolutionary processes associated with mate choice and reproductive competition. I use the language appropriate to sexually reproducing animals, but many of the issues apply as well to plants (see e.g., Queller, 1994; Snow, 1994; Willson and Burley, 1983).