Meeting Abstract

25.5  Friday, Jan. 4  Searching for evidence of a runaway process in art and literature KOCH, RE*; HILL, GE; Auburn University; Auburn University rebeccabethkoch@gmail.com

Although sexual selection is universally accepted as an explanation for ornamental traits in animals, the specific mechanisms that produce extreme elaboration of display traits remain unresolved. The runaway sexual selection model proposes that arbitrary female preference can escalate to drive a male display to a novel and sometimes extreme form in a short period of time. The actual speed of such trait change has never been stated specifically, but it is always presented as much faster than that of traits evolving through natural selection. Many changes in morphological traits have been documented in wild animals on a time scale of decades; we can therefore expect a runaway process to produce novel ornamental traits at least that rapidly. Though the runaway model has been validated by mathematical simulation, no empirical study to date has shown clear evidence of the process in action. Because runaway sexual selection is quick-acting by nature, we should expect to find indications of rapid change in ornamental traits documented in literature or reflected in art as the same species of animal is illustrated across centuries. We searched for evidence of such changes by examining lifelike bird art from the past 100-5000 years and comparing the visual traits of these birds to those of their modern counterparts. We also searched the literature and interviewed experienced ornithologists for examples of such change. To date we have found no cases of rapid change in sexually selected traits in any species of bird.