scholarly journals Stochastic Evolutionary Demography under a Fluctuating Optimum Phenotype

2017 ◽  
Vol 190 (6) ◽  
pp. 786-802 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luis-Miguel Chevin ◽  
Olivier Cotto ◽  
Jaime Ashander
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary Demography

Evolutionary Demography of a Bruchid Beetle. II. Physiological Manipulations

1989 ◽  
Vol 3 (6) ◽  
pp. 683 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. Moller ◽  
R. H. Smith ◽  
R. M. Sibly
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary Demography

scholarly journals Financial opportunity costs and deaths among close kin are independently associated with reproductive timing in a contemporary high-income society

2020 ◽  
Vol 287 (1919) ◽  
pp. 20192478
Author(s):  
V. Berg ◽  
D. W. Lawson ◽  
A. Rotkirch
Keyword(s):  
High Income ◽  
Reproductive Timing ◽  
Economic Costs ◽  
Wage Penalty ◽  
Income Loss ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Career Opportunities ◽  
Evolutionary Demography ◽  
Future Reproduction ◽  
Demographic Theory

Evolutionary demography predicts that variation in reproductive timing stems from socio-ecologically contingent trade-offs between current and future reproduction. In contemporary high-income societies, the costs and benefits of current reproduction are likely to vary by socioeconomic status (SES). Two influential hypotheses, focusing on the parenthood ‘wage penalty’, and responses to local mortality have separately been proposed to influence the timing of parenthood. Economic costs of reproduction (i.e. income loss) are hypothesized to delay fertility, especially among high childhood SES individuals who experience greater opportunities to build capital through advantageous education and career opportunities. On the other hand, relatively low childhood SES individuals experience higher mortality risk, which may favour earlier reproduction. Here, we examine both hypotheses with a representative register-based, multigenerational dataset from contemporary Finland ( N = 47 678). Consistent with each hypothesis, the predicted financial cost of early parenthood was smaller, and mortality among close kin was higher for individuals with lower childhood SES. Within the same dataset, lower predicted adulthood income and more kin deaths were also independently associated with earlier parenthood. Our results provide a robust demonstration of how economic costs and mortality relate to reproductive timing. We discuss the implications of our findings for demographic theory and public policy.

The Evolutionary Demography of Sex Ratios in Rural Bangladesh

2014 ◽  
pp. 141-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary K. Shenk ◽  
Mary C. Towner ◽  
Kathrine Starkweather ◽  
Curtis J. Atkisson ◽  
Nurul Alam
Keyword(s):  
Sex Ratios ◽  
Rural Bangladesh ◽  
Evolutionary Demography

scholarly journals Understanding variation in human fertility: what can we learn from evolutionary demography?

2016 ◽  
Vol 371 (1692) ◽  
pp. 20150144 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Sear ◽  
David W. Lawson ◽  
Hillard Kaplan ◽  
Mary K. Shenk
Keyword(s):  
Interdisciplinary Approach ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
High Fertility ◽  
Evolutionary Demography ◽  
Human Fertility ◽  
Dramatic Decline ◽  
Fertility Variation ◽  
History Of ◽  
Causal Nature ◽  
Fitness Maximization

Decades of research on human fertility has presented a clear picture of how fertility varies, including its dramatic decline over the last two centuries in most parts of the world. Why fertility varies, both between and within populations, is not nearly so well understood. Fertility is a complex phenomenon, partly physiologically and partly behaviourally determined, thus an interdisciplinary approach is required to understand it. Evolutionary demographers have focused on human fertility since the 1980s. The first wave of evolutionary demographic research made major theoretical and empirical advances, investigating variation in fertility primarily in terms of fitness maximization. Research focused particularly on variation within high-fertility populations and small-scale subsistence societies and also yielded a number of hypotheses for why fitness maximization seems to break down as fertility declines during the demographic transition. A second wave of evolutionary demography research on fertility is now underway, paying much more attention to the cultural and psychological mechanisms underpinning fertility. It is also engaging with the complex, multi-causal nature of fertility variation, and with understanding fertility in complex modern and transitioning societies. Here, we summarize the history of evolutionary demographic work on human fertility, describe the current state of the field, and suggest future directions.

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