Parent-child conflict
Parent-child conflict is an evolutionary theoretical model coined by Robert Trivers in 1974, which results in a conflict between parents and offspring about the amount of effort involved in parents . The parenting effort is defined here as any behavior that increases the fitness of one offspring and at the same time reduces the parenting effort for other offspring. Parents strive to maximize the number of surviving offspring. The individual offspring also seeks to maximize the number of their own offspring. If the offspring are not passive recipients of parental effort, but actively request it, a conflict between parents and offspring can result. In particular, conflicts arise about how much and how long parents invest in their offspring. The model predicts that offspring will use various manipulations to get more resources from their parents (but also that parents have developed defensive mechanisms against it).
Individual evidence
- ^ Robert Trivers: Parent-Offspring Conflict . In: American Zoologist . Volume 14, pp. 249-264, doi : 10.1093 / icb / 14.1.249 .