The mating game article

To confirm that result and better pin down exactly how the female brain responds to the mating strategies of males, Cummings and her students, including undergraduates in the Freshman Research Initiative , are orchestrating a series of remarkable long-term experiments with female fish. Some females grow up around all types of male mating behaviors.

Others meet only courting males or only coercive ones. Still others have no males around at all. Then the team sees how the female fish exposed to these different environments perform on various tests of cognitive abilities and behavioral traits.

For a fish, that means measuring traits associated with sociability, anxiety, exploration and even simple math.

Lonely males crouching along the brims of puddles call out in the night, hoping to attract females, while also hoping to avoid attention from nearby frog-eating bats. Males start their calls with a low-pitched whine and then sometimes tack on a series of higher pitched sounds called chucks.

The females are attracted to calls with more chucks, but the bats are attracted to the sound, too. The team found females evolved these organs before the males started making the sounds. That male traits are driven to evolve by the way the female brain processes information — in other words, by what females find beautiful — is a big idea in evolutionary biology.

But then if a third, much-less-attractive call is added to the mix, about a third of the time, females would switch to the one with the second-most-attractive calls.

Ultimately, the female brain, which evolved to do many other things besides finding mates, has its own limitations and quirks, and it conjures up an aesthetic that males strive to match. Then we ask a high- and a low-quality individual from each sex to describe their experience.

What was their mating strategy? Did it work? Was it hard for them to get a mate? Was there anyone they would not agree to mate with? Students typically have no trouble articulating the appropriate reproductive strategy for an individual of their sex and quality and justifying their answer. Sometimes, individuals or groups develop alternative strategies that can be discussed.

If time permits, we ask students to think about scenarios that might cause them to alter their strategy. For example, what if assessing the quality of a potential mate takes time and is not as easy or reliable as simply counting dots on a hat? What if females had to walk a mile to deliver their gametes to the instructor, rather than just across the room?

At this point, we introduce the terms parental investment and operational sex ratio. To formalize the relationship between parental investment, operational sex ratio, and sex roles, we ask students to choose the right words to complete a conceptual flowchart Figure 3 ; adapted from Alcock, Following the exercise and discussion, we ask students to complete this conceptual flowchart to formalize the relationship between parental investment and sex roles.

Students are instructed to select the correct bold word s in each box. Adapted from figure in Alcock, We introduce the pipefish Nerophis ophidion. In this species, a female deposits her eggs on the ventral surface of a male, and the male cares for the embryos until independent young emerge several weeks later.

Males have a lower potential reproductive rate in this species because one female can impregnate two males during the time of one male pregnancy Vincent et al. When given a choice between females, males show a strong preference for larger females, which are more fecund Rosenqvist, Active-learning methods can enhance understanding and retention in undergraduate science courses Handelsman et al. Our students report that the mating game is a fun, effective, and memorable demonstration of the evolutionary forces that shape mating strategies.

Thus, it is an excellent springboard for exploring more advanced topics in reproductive behavior that build upon the underlying concept of sex differences. Referring back to the game, ask students to brainstorm potential benefits a female might receive from mating with a high-quality male. This list can be used to launch a discussion of intersexual selection.

In our experience, students have participated enthusiastically in the game. In surveys, no student has ever reported feeling awkward or uncomfortable during the simulation. Of course, any activity that deals with sex has the potential to become sensitive. Instructors should be prepared to discuss that human behavior, though sculpted by evolution, is more immediately shaped by social and cultural forces. We recommend that this activity be used only with advanced high school or college students who possess the maturity to handle these topics.

We thank Shelley Haydel, Ron Rutowski, Valerie Stout, Melissah Rowe, Mike Butler, and the students in their Scientific Teaching course for help in developing this activity; Nicola Plowes for allowing us to test it in her Animal Behavior class; and two anonymous reviewers for their comments on the manuscript. Sign In or Create an Account. User Tools. Sign In. Skip Nav Destination Article Navigation. Close mobile search navigation Article navigation.

Volume 74, Issue 9. Previous Article Next Article. Article Navigation. Research Article November 01 This Site. Google Scholar. Tate Holbrook ; C. Tate Holbrook. If you can reduce the risk about being in the right place at the right time by having someone local there for longer, you give yourself the opportunity to create even something more magical. A case in point was the bullfrog scenes. A South African filmmaker, Russell MacLaughlin , lives close to the spot in Limpopo province and so could be on hand when the right rain swept in.

McLaughlin said he began waiting for the moment in November last year but it was not until February that two cyclones hit the African shoreline in quick succession. The pools filled and the frogs appeared. You have to react very quickly. He spent 16 weeks awaiting their arrival.