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. 1982 Jun;79(11):3575–3578. doi: 10.1073/pnas.79.11.3575

Evolution of interference competition by individual, family, and group selection

Michael J Wade 1
PMCID: PMC346464  PMID: 16578763

Abstract

The necessary conditions for the evolution of social behaviors in a population with three levels of biological organization are derived by using a population genetic model (one locus, two alleles, random mating, discrete generations). Total selection on the behavior, Δq, is partitioned into the sum of three components: (i) ΔqI, selection between individuals within families; (ii) ΔqF, selection between families within groups; and (iii) ΔqG, selection between groups of families. I show that any level of selection can be made to operate in concert with or in opposition to any other, depending upon the fitness effects of the behavior. The implications of the model are discussed in relation to those adaptive explanations of phenotypic traits that generally consider selection to operate only between individuals.

Keywords: population structure, levels of selection, behavior

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Selected References

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

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