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WP 04-2

Marion Blute. The Evolutionary Socioecology of Communication

Keywords: evolutionary socioecology of communication, signal strength, rituals.

Abstract:

This paper begins with a brief introduction to multi-process selection theory, to what explains the existing array of alternatives in evolving populations, and to some basic principles of evolutionary ecology. Evolutionary ecology asks, and seeks to answer, the question of under what ecological conditions selection favours what kinds of characteristics including the behavioural, characteristics oriented towards the physical environment and other species. While communication is sometimes involved in interaction among species, it is more prevalent among members of the same population or species. Evolutionary socioecology then asks and seeks to answer the same question about ecologically versus socially oriented characteristics as well as the purely social. In discussing some general principles of the evolutionary socioecology of communication, this paper pays particular attention to the sometimes cooperative, sometimes antagonistic, and often mixed nature of social communication.  It concludes with a discussion of what determines the “loudness” of signals and what “rituals” are communicating.

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