The Evolution of Parental Care

Parental care includes a wide variety of traits that enhance offspring development and survival. It is taxonomically widespread and is central to the maintenance of biodiversity through its close association with other phenomena such as sexual selection, life-history evolution, sex allocation, sociality, cooperation and conflict, growth and development, genetic architecture, and phenotypic plasticity. This novel book provides a fresh perspective on the study of the evolution of parental care based on contributions from some of the top researchers in the field. It provides evidence that the dynamic nature of family interactions, and particularly the potential for co-evolution among family members, has contributed to the great diversity of forms of parental care and life-histories across as well as within taxa. The Evolution of Parental Care aims to stimulate students and researchers alike to pursue exciting new directions in this fascinating and important area of behavioural and evolutionary biology. It will be of relevance and use to those working in the fields of animal behaviour, ecology, evolution, and genetics, as well as related disciplines such as psychology and sociology.Foreword ; 1. What is parental care? ; SECTION 1 - ORIGIN AND EVOLUTION OF PARENTAL CARE ; 2. Theoretical foundations of parental care ; 3. Benefits and costs of parental care ; 4. Patterns of parental care in vertebrates ; 5. Patterns of parental care in invertebrates ; 6. Sex differences in parental care ; SECTION 2 - CONFLICT AND COOPERATION IN PARENTAL CARE ; 7. Parent-offspring conflict ; 8. Sibling competition and cooperation over parental care ; 9. Sexual conflict ; 10. Sex allocation ; 11. Paternity, maternity, and parental care ; 12. Cooperative breeding systems ; 13. Brood parasitism ; SECTION 3 - EVOLUTIONARY GENETICS OF PARENTAL CARE ; 14. Parental effects in development and evolution ; 15. The quantitative genetic theory of parental effects ; 16. Parent-offspring co-adaptation ; 17. Genetics and epigenetics of parental care ; CONCLUSIONS ; 18. The evolution of parental care: summary, conclusions and implications ; Index