{"id":23401,"date":"2021-01-10T22:59:00","date_gmt":"2021-01-11T02:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=23401"},"modified":"2021-01-15T16:52:55","modified_gmt":"2021-01-15T20:52:55","slug":"mate-selection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/","title":{"rendered":"Mate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What is mate selection<\/a> and how does it happen in nature? How important is attractiveness in the process?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mate selection is the process by which animals select partners for making and raising offspring. The importance of physical attraction varies, but there are certain qualities important for mate selection in nature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read more about mate selection in nature and the importance of physical attraction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Attractiveness<\/strong> and Mate Selection<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Contrary to the previous section, wherein females tried to ensure that their partners would stick around and contribute to raising the offspring, in some species they\u2019ll completely set aside the idea of a long-term partner in mate selection. In such species, females will simply look for males with the most desirable traits and breed with them. <\/strong>An interesting side effect of this is that there’s a higher importance on physical attraction, regardless of its survival value. An attractive male could breed with many different females and spread his genes very quickly. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This leads to what could be considered \u201cfashion.\u201d Even if the attractive quality is objectively harmful, such as excessively long tail feathers in certain bird species (which take more resources to grow and could make the bird easier for predators to spot and catch), females who don\u2019t bear children with that quality have less of a chance of their genes continuing to survive, because their offspring will not reproduce as successfully as other members of the species.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An alternative mate selection theory to sexual attractiveness states that these handicaps evolved because <\/em>they are handicaps\u2014males who survive with such handicaps are demonstrating that their other genes must be very strong. However, scientists haven\u2019t been able to work this handicap theory into a logical model of evolution. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In some species such as elephant seals, this leads to situations where a single male can have an enormous harem of females, while many other males do not breed at all. In the case of elephant seals, the harem holder becomes such simply by fighting off all other males. By breeding with attractive or strong males, the females are more likely to produce offspring who will themselves be successful breeders, thereby keeping the selfish genes alive. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Given that one male can impregnate many females, it would seem like the ideal sex distribution would be skewed heavily toward females. However, the ESS in mammals is roughly 50% male to 50% female, and the selfish gene theory<\/a> can explain why. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

First of all, sex is determined by a single chromosome: The presence of a Y chromosome makes an animal male, and a father has a 50% chance of passing on his Y chromosome to his offspring. A female has two X chromosomes, and will always pass one on to her offspring. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Shortform note: There are genetic conditions where a mammal may have something other than the typical XX or XY setup, but these rare cases don\u2019t change the main point<\/a> of this section.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s theoretically possible that genes could evolve that favor X chromosomes, skewing the sex ratio in favor of females. However, if that happened, parents of males would be at a huge genetic advantage.<\/strong> Due to a shortage of males their offspring would probably mate with many different females, giving them a huge number of grandchildren compared to parents of females. The number of Y chromosomes in the population would then increase until the sex distribution was back to the roughly 50\/50 balance we see in nature. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a result of this 50\/50 distribution, in many species, females are highly sought after for mate selection. Meanwhile, there are many more males than necessary. This often leads to males being colorful, flashy, and loud, because they have to compete for mates while females can afford to be picky. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What is mate selection and how does it happen in nature? How important is attractiveness in the process? Mate selection is the process by which animals select partners for making and raising offspring. The importance of physical attraction varies, but there are certain qualities important for mate selection in nature. Read more about mate selection in nature and the importance of physical attraction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":12986,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,160,24],"tags":[187],"class_list":["post-23401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-relationships","category-science","category-society","tag-the-selfish-gene","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"\nMate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"How does an animal pick a partner? Mate selection varies between species. Read more about it and the importance of physical attraction.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Mate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"How does an animal pick a partner? Mate selection varies between species. Read more about it and the importance of physical attraction.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Shortform Books\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-01-11T02:59:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-01-15T20:52:55+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2560\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1707\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Rina Shah\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Rina Shah\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Rina Shah\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/d07435826f13a8f422d5d333dceac287\"},\"headline\":\"Mate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-01-11T02:59:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-01-15T20:52:55+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/\"},\"wordCount\":638,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"The Selfish Gene\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Relationships\",\"Science\",\"Society\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/\",\"name\":\"Mate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature - Shortform Books\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-01-11T02:59:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-01-15T20:52:55+00:00\",\"description\":\"How does an animal pick a partner? Mate selection varies between species. Read more about it and the importance of physical attraction.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg\",\"width\":2560,\"height\":1707},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Mate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Shortform Books\",\"description\":\"The World's Best Book Summaries\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Shortform Books\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png\",\"width\":500,\"height\":74,\"caption\":\"Shortform Books\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"}},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/d07435826f13a8f422d5d333dceac287\",\"name\":\"Rina Shah\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/560b3bc3d51625f9becff4fded992607b156f274aa36bc07f8a4285a1d72cdc8?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/560b3bc3d51625f9becff4fded992607b156f274aa36bc07f8a4285a1d72cdc8?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Rina Shah\"},\"description\":\"An avid reader for as long as she can remember, Rina\u2019s love for books began with The Boxcar Children. Her penchant for always having a book nearby has never faded, though her reading tastes have since evolved. Rina reads around 100 books every year, with a fairly even split between fiction and non-fiction. Her favorite genres are memoirs, public health, and locked room mysteries. As an attorney, Rina can\u2019t help analyzing and deconstructing arguments in any book she reads.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/author\/rina\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Mate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature - Shortform Books","description":"How does an animal pick a partner? Mate selection varies between species. Read more about it and the importance of physical attraction.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Mate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature","og_description":"How does an animal pick a partner? Mate selection varies between species. Read more about it and the importance of physical attraction.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/","og_site_name":"Shortform Books","article_published_time":"2021-01-11T02:59:00+00:00","article_modified_time":"2021-01-15T20:52:55+00:00","og_image":[{"width":2560,"height":1707,"url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Rina Shah","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Rina Shah","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/"},"author":{"name":"Rina Shah","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/d07435826f13a8f422d5d333dceac287"},"headline":"Mate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature","datePublished":"2021-01-11T02:59:00+00:00","dateModified":"2021-01-15T20:52:55+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/"},"wordCount":638,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg","keywords":["The Selfish Gene"],"articleSection":["Relationships","Science","Society"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/","name":"Mate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature - Shortform Books","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg","datePublished":"2021-01-11T02:59:00+00:00","dateModified":"2021-01-15T20:52:55+00:00","description":"How does an animal pick a partner? Mate selection varies between species. Read more about it and the importance of physical attraction.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg","width":2560,"height":1707},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/mate-selection\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Mate Selection and the Role of Attractiveness in Nature"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/","name":"Shortform Books","description":"The World's Best Book Summaries","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"Shortform Books","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png","width":500,"height":74,"caption":"Shortform Books"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/d07435826f13a8f422d5d333dceac287","name":"Rina Shah","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/560b3bc3d51625f9becff4fded992607b156f274aa36bc07f8a4285a1d72cdc8?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/560b3bc3d51625f9becff4fded992607b156f274aa36bc07f8a4285a1d72cdc8?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Rina Shah"},"description":"An avid reader for as long as she can remember, Rina\u2019s love for books began with The Boxcar Children. Her penchant for always having a book nearby has never faded, though her reading tastes have since evolved. Rina reads around 100 books every year, with a fairly even split between fiction and non-fiction. Her favorite genres are memoirs, public health, and locked room mysteries. As an attorney, Rina can\u2019t help analyzing and deconstructing arguments in any book she reads.","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/author\/rina\/"}]}},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/kiss-close-the-game-scaled.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23401"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23401\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24110,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23401\/revisions\/24110"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}