Does nepotism make populations more or less vulnerable to environmental change?

• Applicant: Liam Bailey, Ph.D.
• Subject Area: Ecology and Biodiversity of Animals and Ecosystems, Organismic Interactions ; Evolution, Anthropology
• Term: from 2020 to 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 433159566

Cultural inheritance of social status is an intriguing phenomenon where an individual’s position in the social hierarchy is driven by social support from relatives rather than individual quality. This nepotistic behaviour is observed in primates, including lemurs, cercopithecines, and humans, and in the spotted hyena. The occurrence of nepotism in social position creates strict hierarchies where societal benefits are strongly skewed to a particular sub-group of individuals, leading to large inequalities between members of the society. This is apparent in the large reproductive skew of the spotted hyena and disparities in educational attainment and income observed in human society.Although the occurrence of nepotism in animal societies has been well documented, it is still unclear how nepotistic animal societies are affected by environmental change. Is the strong social hierarchy of a nepotistic society affected by demographic change? Does the occurrence of nepotism make a population more or less vulnerable to environmental change? Does nepotism increase or decrease genetic diversity and affect the potential for natural selection? The large reproductive skew that occurs in many nepotistic societies may limit genetic diversity and so reduce capacity to respond to environmental change. Alternatively, nepotistic societies may persist through environmental change because high ranking individuals are buffered from harsh conditions. These questions are important to understand because environmental conditions will vary with climate change and wildlife management practices.In this 36 month project we propose to study the effects of environmental change on the nepotistic society of the spotted hyena. This species has been the focus of research for more than 50 years, with detailed knowledge on mate choice, foraging, and dispersal behaviour. The spotted hyena is also an important study species as it plays a key role in the African savannah habitat as a mediator of herbivore disease and as a competitor with other large carnivores. The project will be based at the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research in Berlin, a leader in spotted hyena research, and will use a combination of published research, a multi-decadal observational and genetic dataset, and novel environmental data collected in Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania to build a computer simulation model of hyena society. Using a modelling approach we will be able to conduct in-silico experimental simulations to test the effect of rare environmental conditions (e.g. food shortage, disease outbreak) and make predictions about the effects of ongoing environmental change (e.g. climate change, wildlife management).This project will provide a better understanding of the effects of environmental change on this important species of the African savannah and will generate predictions that can be tested in other nepotistic societies, such as those seen in social primates.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants