Sexual size dimorphism in birds
Abstract
Birds provide excellent model organisms for testing functional explanations of sexual size dimorphism (SSD), since many species are exceptionally well-studied in nature. This chapter reviews four major functional hypotheses of SSD, and tests these using data on five morphometric traits from over 2,500 bird species. This comprehensive analysis reveals that SSD is male-biased in most avian species and families, and that allometry consistent with Rensch's rule occurs in significantly more avian families than expected by chance. Using cross-species analyses, the chapter shows that the pattern of SSD is most consistent with patterns of sexual selection, specifically with the Mating competition and the Display agility hypotheses. Sexual selection, however, is unlikely to explain all variation in SSD, and further work is essential on ecological use of resources and fecundity selection.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Raptors generally show female-biased sexual size dimorphism, an opposite trend to most birds and mammals, termed reversed sexual dimorphism (RSD).
“Raptors generally show female-biased sexual size dimorphism, an opposite trend to what is observed in most bird and mammal species, thus usually termed reversed sexual dimorphism (hereafter RSD) (Amadon 1959;Andersson and Norberg 1981;Székely et al. 2007).”
From Structural complexity of hunting habitat and territoriality increase the reversed sexual size dimorphism in diurnal raptors (2018) · cites this paper as Székely et al. 2007
Cites
Phylogenies and the Comparative Method
Felsenstein, J. (1985) · The American Naturalist · doi:10.1086/284325 · Cited by 9,793 · see citing works
The measurement of selection on correlated characters
Lande, R., & Arnold, S. J. (1983) · Evolution · doi:10.1111/j.1558-5646.1983.tb00236.x · Cited by 5,437 · see citing works
The delayed rise of present-day mammals
Bininda-Emonds, O. R. P., Cardillo, M., Jones, K. E., MacPhee, R. D. E., Beck, R. M. D., Grenyer, R., Price, S. A., Vos, R. A., Gittleman, J. L., & Purvis, A. (2007) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature05634 · Cited by 2,082 · see citing works
Developmental plasticity and human health
Bateson, P., Barker, D., Clutton-Brock, T., Deb, D., D'Udine, B., Foley, R. A., Gluckman, P., Godfrey, K., Kirkwood, T., Lahr, M. M., et al. (2004) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature02725 · Cited by 1,742 · see citing works
Life History Invariants: Some Explorations of Symmetry in Evolutionary Ecology
Charnov, E. L. (1993) · doi:10.1093/oso/9780198540724.001.0001 · Cited by 1,254 · see citing works
The function of nuptial feeding in insects: a review of empirical studies
VAHED, K. (1998) · Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society · doi:10.1017/s0006323197005112 · Cited by 457 · see citing works
Pietsch, T. W. (2005) · Ichthyological Research · doi:10.1007/s10228-005-0286-2 · Cited by 130 · see citing works
The role of sexual steroids in the modulation of growth hormone (GH) secretion in humans.
Devesa, J., Lois, N., Arce, V., Diaz, M. J., Lima, L., & Tresguerres, J. A. F. (1991) · The Journal of Steroid Biochemistry and Molecular Biology · doi:10.1016/0960-0760(91)90179-9 · Cited by 98 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Pérez‐Camacho, L., Martínez‐Hesterkamp, S., Rebollo, S., García‐Salgado, G., & Morales‐Castilla, I. (2018) · Journal of Avian Biology · doi:10.1111/jav.01745 · Cited by 18 · see citing works
- Authors
- Székely, T., Lislevand, T., & Figuerola, J.
- Affiliations
- University of Bergen (NO)
- Estación Biológica de Doñana (ES)
- Venue
- Sex, Size and Gender Roles
- Publisher
- Oxford University PressOxford
- Published
- 2007-07-05
- Pages
- 27-37
- OpenAlex
- W320272028
- Cited by
- 160
- References
- 8
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 10 · 2023: 12 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 9 · 2020: 12 · 2019: 10 · 2018: 14 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 11 · 2015: 8 · 2014: 11 · 2013: 13 · 2012: 3
- FWCI
- 9.85
- Type
- book chapter
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics › Animal Behavior and Reproduction
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Avian ecology and behavior
- Physical Sciences › Mathematics › Geometry and Topology › Morphological variations and asymmetry
- Keywords
- sexual size dimorphism, birds, sexual selection, Rensch's rule, allometry, morphometric parameters, fecundity selection, resource utilization
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
