title: The evolution of sensitive periods in a model of incremental development.
abstract: Sensitive periods, in which experience shapes phenotypic development to a larger extent than other periods, are widespread in nature. Despite a recent focus on neural-physiological explanation, few formal models have examined the evolutionary selection pressures that result in developmental mechanisms that produce sensitive periods. Here, we present such a model. We model development as a specialization process during which individuals incrementally adapt to local environmental conditions, while receiving a constant stream of cost-free, imperfect cues to the environmental state. We compute optimal developmental programmes across a range of ecological conditions and use these programmes to simulate developmental trajectories and obtain distributions of mature phenotypes. We highlight four main results. First, matching the empirical record, sensitive periods often result from experience or from a combination of age and experience, but rarely from age alone. Second, individual differences in sensitive periods emerge as a result of stochasticity in cues: individuals who obtain more consistent cue sets lose their plasticity at faster rates. Third, in some cases, experience shapes phenotypes only at a later life stage (lagged effects). Fourth, individuals might perseverate along developmental trajectories despite accumulating evidence suggesting the alternate trajectory is more likely to match the ecology.
authors.affiliation: Department of Anthropology, University of Missouri, 107 Swallow Hall, Columbia, MO 65211-1440, USA.
authors.forename: Karthik
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Panchanathan
authors.affiliation: Behavioural Science Institute, Radboud University Nijmegen, Montessorilaan 3, PO Box 9104, Nijmegen, 6500 HE, The Netherlands wfrankenhuis@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Willem E
authors.initials: WE
authors.lastname: Frankenhuis
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D004777:Environment; D048788:Growth and Development; D008954:Models, Biological; D012641:Selection, Genetic; D013269:Stochastic Processes
keywords: Bayesian updating; adaptation; cues; development; evolution; sensitive periods
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