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Audience Effect Alters Male Mating Preferences in Zebra Finches (Taeniopygia guttata)

The social environment of animals strongly influences the mating preferences of both the choosing and the observing individuals. Notably, there is recent evidence that polygamous males decrease their selectivity when being observed by competitors in order to direct their rivals’ attention away from...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Dubois, Frédérique, Belzile, Alexandra
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2012
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3423349/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22916298
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0043697
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author Dubois, Frédérique
Belzile, Alexandra
author_facet Dubois, Frédérique
Belzile, Alexandra
author_sort Dubois, Frédérique
collection PubMed
description The social environment of animals strongly influences the mating preferences of both the choosing and the observing individuals. Notably, there is recent evidence that polygamous males decrease their selectivity when being observed by competitors in order to direct their rivals’ attention away from their true interest and, consequently, reduce sperm competition risk. Yet, other mechanisms, whose importance remains unexplored, could induce similar effects. In monogamous species with mutual choice, particularly, if males adjust their selectivity according to the risk of being rejected by their preferred mate, they should as well become less selective when potential rivals are present. Here, we investigated whether the presence of bystanders modifies male mating preferences when the risk of sperm competition is low, by carrying out mate-choice experiments with male zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata) whose preferences for two females were measured twice: with and without an audience. We found that the presence of potential rivals had no effect on the males’ choosiness. However, with an audience, they spent more time with the female that was considered as the less attractive one in the control condition. These findings support the hypothesis that monogamous males alter their mate choice decisions in the presence of a male audience to reduce the risk of remaining unpaired. Thus, our results indicate that several explanations can account for the changes in male preferences due to the presence of competitors and highlight the importance of assessing the relative role of each mechanism potentially involved, to be able to make conclusions about the effect of an audience on signal evolution.
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spelling pubmed-34233492012-08-22 Audience Effect Alters Male Mating Preferences in Zebra Finches (Taeniopygia guttata) Dubois, Frédérique Belzile, Alexandra PLoS One Research Article The social environment of animals strongly influences the mating preferences of both the choosing and the observing individuals. Notably, there is recent evidence that polygamous males decrease their selectivity when being observed by competitors in order to direct their rivals’ attention away from their true interest and, consequently, reduce sperm competition risk. Yet, other mechanisms, whose importance remains unexplored, could induce similar effects. In monogamous species with mutual choice, particularly, if males adjust their selectivity according to the risk of being rejected by their preferred mate, they should as well become less selective when potential rivals are present. Here, we investigated whether the presence of bystanders modifies male mating preferences when the risk of sperm competition is low, by carrying out mate-choice experiments with male zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata) whose preferences for two females were measured twice: with and without an audience. We found that the presence of potential rivals had no effect on the males’ choosiness. However, with an audience, they spent more time with the female that was considered as the less attractive one in the control condition. These findings support the hypothesis that monogamous males alter their mate choice decisions in the presence of a male audience to reduce the risk of remaining unpaired. Thus, our results indicate that several explanations can account for the changes in male preferences due to the presence of competitors and highlight the importance of assessing the relative role of each mechanism potentially involved, to be able to make conclusions about the effect of an audience on signal evolution. Public Library of Science 2012-08-20 /pmc/articles/PMC3423349/ /pubmed/22916298 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0043697 Text en © 2012 Dubois, Belzile http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Dubois, Frédérique
Belzile, Alexandra
Audience Effect Alters Male Mating Preferences in Zebra Finches (Taeniopygia guttata)
title Audience Effect Alters Male Mating Preferences in Zebra Finches (Taeniopygia guttata)
title_full Audience Effect Alters Male Mating Preferences in Zebra Finches (Taeniopygia guttata)
title_fullStr Audience Effect Alters Male Mating Preferences in Zebra Finches (Taeniopygia guttata)
title_full_unstemmed Audience Effect Alters Male Mating Preferences in Zebra Finches (Taeniopygia guttata)
title_short Audience Effect Alters Male Mating Preferences in Zebra Finches (Taeniopygia guttata)
title_sort audience effect alters male mating preferences in zebra finches (taeniopygia guttata)
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3423349/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22916298
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0043697
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