SynthesisOecologia2021
Costs of territoriality: a review of hypotheses, meta-analysis, and field study.
Synthesis in Oecologia, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 30 papers.
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Who cites it
30 citing papers in PubMed.
- Double Parasitism by Two Cuckoo Gentes in a Daurian Redstart Nest.Ecology and evolution · 2026Article
- Dichotomous Regulation of Social Behaviors by Nucleus Accumbens Neurons in Female and Male Syrian Hamsters.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2026Article
- Condition-dependent success of resource-based reproductive tactics across both sexes inBehavioral ecology and sociobiology · 2026Article
- Sex-specific site preferences in response to resource value inBehavioral ecology and sociobiology · 2026Article
- Territory proximity influences aggression and modulates the relationship between social dominance and oxidative stress in a highly social African cichlid fish.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Environmental quality shapes the fitness payoffs of multiple paternity.BMC ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Similar Survival Rates of Territorial and Sneaker Males in a Polymorphic Damselfly: A Multi-Year Study.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Non-breeding social behaviour as an investment in reducing future territoriality costs.Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society · 2025Review
- First quantitative evidence of territorial behavior in squid near spawning substrates.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Male reproductive tactics in house mice: Consistent individual differences, intrinsic factors and density effects.The Journal of animal ecology · 2025Article
- To Hunt or Patrol? Social Composition and Location Mediate Scent Marking Decisions of a Large Carnivore.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Individual Mechanical Energy Expenditure Regimens Vary Seasonally with Weather, Sex, Age and Body Condition in a Generalist Carnivore Population: Support for Inter-Individual Tactical Diversity.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2025Article
- The value of human resources changes with season for a social desert passerine bird.npj biodiversity · 2025Article
- Birds With Distinct Ecological Traits Show Varied Haemoglobin Adaptations Along Elevation Gradients.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Territoriality Modulates the Effect of Conspecific Encounters on the Foraging Behaviours of a Mammalian Predator.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Strategic use of male alternative reproductive tactics in cooperatively breeding banded mongoose groups.Royal Society open science · 2025Article
- Competitive social feedback amplifies the role of early life contingency in male mice.Science (New York, N.Y.) · 2025Article
- Social mates dynamically coordinate aggressive behavior to produce strategic territorial defense.PLoS computational biology · 2025Article
- Variation in Lipid Peroxidation in the Ejaculates of Wild Banded Mongooses (Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Lifetime trajectories of male mating effort under reproductive conflict in a cooperatively breeding mammal.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
1 author.
Funding
Abstract
The evolution of territoriality reflects the balance between the benefit and cost of monopolising a resource. While the benefit of territoriality is generally intuitive (improved access to resources), our understanding of its cost is less clear. This paper combines: 1. a review of hypotheses and meta-analytic benchmarking of costs across diverse taxa; and 2. a new empirical test of hypotheses using a longitudinal study of free-living male territorial lizards. The cost of territoriality was best described as a culmination of multiple factors, but especially costs resulting from the time required to maintain a territory (identified by the meta-analysis) or those exacerbated by a territory that is large in size (identified by the empirical test). The meta-analysis showed that physiological costs such as energetic expenditure or stress were largely negligible in impact on territory holders. Species that used territories to monopolise access to mates appeared to incur the greatest costs, whereas those defending food resources experienced the least. The single largest gap in our current understanding revealed by the literature review is the potential cost associated with increased predation. There is also a clear need for multiple costs to be evaluated concurrently in a single species. The empirical component of this study showcases a powerful analytical framework for evaluating a range of hypotheses using correlational data obtained in the field. More broadly, this paper highlights key factors that should be considered in any investigation that attempts to account for the evolutionary origin or ecological variation in territorial behaviour within and between species.
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Registered trials
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