Trivers-Willard at birth and one year: evidence from US natality data 1983-2001

被引:70
作者
Almond, Douglas
Edlund, Lena [1 ]
机构
[1] Columbia Univ, Dept Econ, New York, NY 10027 USA
[2] Natl Bur Econ Res, Cambridge, MA 02138 USA
关键词
Trivers-Willard; human population; early life mortality; sex allocation;
D O I
10.1098/rspb.2007.0524
中图分类号
Q [生物科学];
学科分类号
07 [理学]; 0710 [生物学]; 09 [农学];
摘要
Trivers & Willard (TW) hypothesized that evolution would favour deviations from the population sex ratio in response to parental condition: parents in good condition would have more sons and parents in poor condition would have more daughters. We analyse the universe of US linked births and infant deaths to white mothers 1983 - 2001, covering 48 million births and 310 000 deaths. We find that (i) married, better educated and younger mothers bore more sons and (ii) infant deaths were more male if the mother was unmarried and young. Our findings highlight the potential role of offspring sex ratio as an indicator of maternal status, and the role of infant mortality in shaping a TW pattern in the breeding population.
引用
收藏
页码:2491 / 2496
页数:6
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