Skip to main content
NCBI home page
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America logoLink to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
. 1984 Mar;81(6):1754–1758. doi: 10.1073/pnas.81.6.1754

On the evolution of altruism by kin selection

Carlo Matessi *, Samuel Karlin †,†
PMCID: PMC344998  PMID: 16593437

Abstract

A general model for the evolution of altruism is formulated. Central to the model is a pair of local fitness functions, which prescribe the fitness of the altruist and selfish phenotypes as functions of the composition of local groups into which prereproductives are subdivided. When the local groups are sibships or other kin groups, the model is one for kin selection. Functions for cost and benefit of altruism are derived from the fitness functions. Conditions for evolution of altruism are then determined in terms of cost and benefit. It is shown that the Hamilton rule has quantitative validity only in the special case of linear fitness functions. Sufficient conditions are found for qualitative validity of the Hamilton rule. Qualitative violation of the rule is also possible.

Keywords: cost of altruism, benefit of altruism, Hamilton rule

Full text

PDF
1754

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

  1. Boorman S. A., Levitt P. R. A frequency-dependent natural selection model for the evolution of social cooperation networks. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1973 Jan;70(1):187–189. doi: 10.1073/pnas.70.1.187. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Cavalli-Sforza L. L., Feldman M. W. Darwinian selection and "altruism". Theor Popul Biol. 1978 Oct;14(2):268–280. doi: 10.1016/0040-5809(78)90028-x. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Charlesworth B. Some models of the evolution of altruistic behaviour between siblings. J Theor Biol. 1978 May 22;72(2):297–319. doi: 10.1016/0022-5193(78)90095-4. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Cohen D., Eshel I. On the founder effect and the evolution of altruistic traits. Theor Popul Biol. 1976 Dec;10(3):276–302. doi: 10.1016/0040-5809(76)90020-4. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. Engels W. R. Evolution of altruistic behavior by kin selection: an alternative approach. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1983 Jan;80(2):515–518. doi: 10.1073/pnas.80.2.515. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  6. Eshel I. On the neighbor effect and the evolution of altruistic traits. Theor Popul Biol. 1972 Sep;3(3):258–277. doi: 10.1016/0040-5809(72)90003-2. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  7. Hamilton W. D. The genetical evolution of social behaviour. I. J Theor Biol. 1964 Jul;7(1):1–16. doi: 10.1016/0022-5193(64)90038-4. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  8. Levitt P. R. General kin selection models for genetic evolution of sib altruism in diploid and haplodiploid species. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1975 Nov;72(11):4531–4535. doi: 10.1073/pnas.72.11.4531. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  9. Matessi C., Jayakar S. D. Conditions for the evolution of altruism under Darwinian selection. Theor Popul Biol. 1976 Jun;9(3):360–387. doi: 10.1016/0040-5809(76)90053-8. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  10. Uyenoyama M. K., Feldman M. W., Mueller L. D. Population genetic theory of kin selection: Multiple alleles at one locus. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1981 Aug;78(8):5036–5040. doi: 10.1073/pnas.78.8.5036. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America are provided here courtesy of National Academy of Sciences

RESOURCES