The Evolution of Sexually Selected Traits in Tetrapods
Publisher
The University of Arizona.Rights
Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction, presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author.Abstract
Sexual selection is often considered a powerful evolutionary force which drives speciation and phenotypic diversity in animals, especially vertebrates and arthropods. However, large-scale evolutionary patterns of sexually selected traits are not fully understood in tetrapods. Here, we collected and analyzed data on the evolution of sexually selected traits in tetrapods. We found that visual is the most common sensory modality of sexually selected traits. Female choice is the most common mechanism, although male contest competition is more common when the sampling of tetrapod families is proportional to species richness. We found evidence for correlated evolution between different sexually selected trait modalities. Finally, we found that high phylogenetic signal is present in visual and tactile traits.Type
Electronic Thesistext
dataset
Degree Name
M.S.Degree Level
mastersDegree Program
Graduate CollegeEcology & Evolutionary Biology