Theodosia Hamilton Hadley Lecture
ÒGames Bowerbirds
Play: When Male Competition Turns DestructiveÓ
Friday, September 30, 2005, 3:30 pm
1718 Wood Hall
Dr. Steve Pruett-Jones
Department of Ecology and Evolution
University of Chicago
Dr. Pruett-Jones research concerns the natural selection of social behavior.
Emphasizing quantitative and experimental approaches in the study of natural
populations, he is interested in sexual selection, the economy and evolution of
mating systems, spatial dispersion, and communication. Dr. Pruett-Jones is
currently conducting a field and laboratory investigation of sexual selection
in a group of passerine birds in Australia, the fairy-wrens. Fairy-wrens live
in socially-monogamous groups, but most individuals mate promiscuously with
individuals from other groups. Using a combination of field observations,
direct manipulation of group size and composition, and DNA fingerprinting
analysis of parentage, he is studying both the evolutionary causes and
consequences of reproductive promiscuity in five species in this group.