Publisher
University of Tennessee at Chattanooga
Place of Publication
Chattanooga (Tenn.)
Abstract
Animal social systems have four interrelated components, two of which are social organization and the mating system. One way to represent the mating system is through multiple paternity, which is defined as the percentage of litters with more than one father. This research project looks at variables that might influence multiple paternity including evolutionary relationships, litter size, female body mass, sexual size dimorphism, and male social organization. Results support the literature that multiple paternity increases with increasing litter size. While not significant, multi-male groups seem to have more influence on multiple paternity than other male social organization groups. Lastly, there was no evolutionary relationship to multiple paternity which may be due to behavioral traits not being genetically inherited.
Document Type
posters
Language
English
Rights
http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Recommended Citation
Roberts, Madison, "Monogamy, Who? Cheating in the Animal Kingdom". ReSEARCH Dialogues Conference proceedings. https://scholar.utc.edu/research-dialogues/2024/Proceedings/12.
Monogamy, Who? Cheating in the Animal Kingdom
Animal social systems have four interrelated components, two of which are social organization and the mating system. One way to represent the mating system is through multiple paternity, which is defined as the percentage of litters with more than one father. This research project looks at variables that might influence multiple paternity including evolutionary relationships, litter size, female body mass, sexual size dimorphism, and male social organization. Results support the literature that multiple paternity increases with increasing litter size. While not significant, multi-male groups seem to have more influence on multiple paternity than other male social organization groups. Lastly, there was no evolutionary relationship to multiple paternity which may be due to behavioral traits not being genetically inherited.