The evolution of courtship rituals in monogamous species

In this paper we propose an alternative explanation for the evolution of courtship rituals in monogamous species. We demonstrate, using computer simulations, how male courtship might develop as males exploit response biases in females to manipulate the female into starting reproduction before she has been able to assess the male's intentions. In our coevolutionary simulations, a recurrent, artificial neural network is used to model the female recognition mechanism, while the displaying male is represented by a sequence of signals. Our particular model situation is just one example of how a reproductive conflict could result in the evolution of ritualized displays in monogamous species. Since reproductive conflicts occur even after pair formations, the explanation we propose may also apply to rituals that occur after pair formation.