Hanna Kokko: University of Helsinki Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences

I will present results on both `love´ (sexual selection) and `hatred´ (territorial conflict). In both cases I will investigate the role of `feedback´, that is, ask the question how strongly individual behaviour influences population dynamics, which then feeds back to influence what is adaptive at the individual level. We know that selection does not favour what is good for a group (or species), but do we ask often enough how `bad´ it can get? For example, are sexually selected species expected to be particularly prone to extinction? And, does territoriality in the Seychelles magpie robin (that only this year got its status lifted from critically endangered to endangered) increase its vulnerability to environmental change?
http://www.bec.ucla.edu/papers/Kokko_1.29.07.pdf