Finding a Mate With No Social Skills

TL;DR

This paper investigates how social organization in sexual reproduction can emerge from non-social mechanisms using simulations, suggesting non-social origins for social behaviors.

Contribution

It demonstrates that social organizations like herding and assortative mating can develop without social mechanisms, offering insights into the evolution of social behaviors.

Findings

Social organizations emerge in simulations without social mechanisms.

Non-social origins may facilitate development of social solutions.

Supports the idea that social behaviors can originate from non-social processes.

Abstract

Sexual reproductive behavior has a necessary social coordination component as willing and capable partners must both be in the right place at the right time. While there are many known social behavioral adaptations to support solutions to this problem, we explore the possibility and likelihood of solutions that rely only on non-social mechanisms. We find three kinds of social organization that help solve this social coordination problem (herding, assortative mating, and natal philopatry) emerge in populations of simulated agents with no social mechanisms available to support these organizations. We conclude that the non-social origins of these social organizations around sexual reproduction may provide the environment for the development of social solutions to the same and different problems.