MRD
MHC-Mediated Relatedness Detector
Class: IV - Unknown or Disputed
EPA Total Score: 7 /100
Manning, C. J., Wakeland, E. K., and Potts, W. K. (1992). Communal nesting patterns in mice implicate MHC genes in kin recognition. Nature, 360, 581-583.
Abstract: House mice (Mus musculus domesticus) form communal nests and appear to nurse each other's pups indiscriminately. Communal nesting probably functions to reduce infanticide, but it also makes females vulnerable to exploitation if nursing partners fail to provide their fair share of care. Kinship theory predicts that females will preferentially form communal nests with relatives to minimize exploitation and further increase inclusive fitness. Here we provide evidence from seminatural populations that females prefer communal nesting partners that share allelic forms of major histocompatibility complex genes. Such behaviour would lead to the selection of close relatives as communal nesting partners. Although criteria for the demonstration of kin recognition are currently embroiled in controversy, this is the first vertebrate study to meet Grafen's restrictive requirements: discrimination is based on genetic similarity at highly polymorphic loci, incidental correlations due to relatedness are experimentally controlled, and strong reasons exist for expecting the assayed behaviour to be kin-selected.
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Supporting Evidence
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10/100
Submitted by DJGlass
10/100
Submitted by DJGlass
10/100
Submitted by DJGlass
No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any supporting Phylogenetic evidence for this EPA.
No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any supporting Hunter-Gatherer evidence for this EPA.
Supporting Evidence is evidence that suggests that this trait is an Evolved Psychological Adaptation (EPA) - i.e., that it has been shaped by natural selection to solve a particular adaptive problem.
Challenging Evidence
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0/100
Submitted by DJGlass
0/100
Submitted by DJGlass
0/100
Submitted by DJGlass
No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any challenging Phylogenetic evidence for this EPA.
No one has (yet) rated this source as containing any challenging Hunter-Gatherer evidence for this EPA.
Challenging Evidence is evidence that suggests that this trait is not an EPA - e.g., that it is a product of cultural learning or genetic drift, or maybe it does not exist at all. However over each line of evidence for a description.