Dataset Information

Are Diet Preferences Associated to Skulls Shape Diversification in Xenodontine Snakes?

ABSTRACT: Snakes are a highly successful group of vertebrates, within great diversity in habitat, diet, and morphology. The unique adaptations for the snake skull for ingesting large prey in more primitive macrostomatan snakes have been well documented. However, subsequent diversification in snake cranial shape in relation to dietary specializations has rarely been studied (e.g. piscivory in natricine snakes). Here we examine a large clade of snakes with a broad spectrum of diet preferences to test if diet preferences are correlated to shape variation in snake skulls. Specifically, we studied the Xenodontinae snakes, a speciose clade of South American snakes, which show a broad range of diets including invertebrates, amphibians, snakes, lizards, and small mammals. We characterized the skull morphology of 19 species of xenodontine snakes using geometric morphometric techniques, and used phylogenetic comparative methods to test the association between diet and skull morphology. Using phylogenetic partial least squares analysis (PPLS) we show that skull morphology is highly associated with diet preferences in xenodontine snakes.

SUBMITTER: Klaczko J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4757418 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Are Diet Preferences Associated to Skulls Shape Diversification in Xenodontine Snakes?

Klaczko Julia J Sherratt Emma E Setz Eleonore Z F EZ

PloS one 20160217 2

Snakes are a highly successful group of vertebrates, within great diversity in habitat, diet, and morphology. The unique adaptations for the snake skull for ingesting large prey in more primitive macrostomatan snakes have been well documented. However, subsequent diversification in snake cranial shape in relation to dietary specializations has rarely been studied (e.g. piscivory in natricine snakes). Here we examine a large clade of snakes with a broad spectrum of diet preferences to test if die ...[more]

PMID: 26886549

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Project description:There is accumulating evidence of condition-dependent mate choice in many species, that is, individual preferences varying in strength according to the condition of the chooser. In humans, for example, people with more attractive faces/bodies, and who are higher in sociosexuality, exhibit stronger preferences for attractive traits in opposite-sex faces/bodies. However, previous studies have tended to use only relatively simple, isolated measures of rater attractiveness. Here we use 3D body scanning technology to examine associations between strength of rater preferences for attractive traits in opposite-sex bodies, and raters' body shape, self-perceived attractiveness, and sociosexuality. For 118 raters and 80 stimuli models, we used a 3D scanner to extract body measurements associated with attractiveness (male waist-chest ratio [WCR], female waist-hip ratio [WHR], and volume-height index [VHI] in both sexes) and also measured rater self-perceived attractiveness and sociosexuality. As expected, WHR and VHI were important predictors of female body attractiveness, while WCR and VHI were important predictors of male body attractiveness. Results indicated that male rater sociosexuality scores were positively associated with strength of preference for attractive (low) VHI and attractive (low) WHR in female bodies. Moreover, male rater self-perceived attractiveness was positively associated with strength of preference for low VHI in female bodies. The only evidence of condition-dependent preferences in females was a positive association between attractive VHI in female raters and preferences for attractive (low) WCR in male bodies. No other significant associations were observed in either sex between aspects of rater body shape and strength of preferences for attractive opposite-sex body traits. These results suggest that among male raters, rater self-perceived attractiveness and sociosexuality are important predictors of preference strength for attractive opposite-sex body shapes, and that rater body traits -with the exception of VHI in female raters- may not be good predictors of these preferences in either sex.

Dataset Information

Are Diet Preferences Associated to Skulls Shape Diversification in Xenodontine Snakes?

Publications

Are Diet Preferences Associated to Skulls Shape Diversification in Xenodontine Snakes?

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