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Male-Male Competition

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Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science

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Synonyms

Intrasexual competition; Intrasexual selection

Definition

Male-Male Competition: Competition between males for access to females.

Introduction

Contest competition in males (male-male competition) is a driving force in sexual selection (Puts 2010). For males, successful competitive displays increase access to valuable resources (e.g., territory, food), mates, and an increase in status. Some mechanisms favor success in male-male competition, such as aggressive behavior and physical characteristics that increase the facilitation of aggressiveness (i.e., size, strength, weaponry). For instance, sea lions establish their dominance through threats and fights, and this has important repercussions to their reproductive success. In a single breeding season, dominant males perform most of the copulations and sire a majority of pups (Daly and Wilson 1983). This intense competition between males was noted in Bateman’s classic 1948 study on sex differences in reproductive strategies using Drosophila...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Oklahoma Center for Evolutionary Analsysis (OCEAN), Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK, USA

    Ray Garza

Authors
  1. Ray Garza
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Correspondence to Ray Garza .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Oakland University, Rochester, MI, USA

    Todd K. Shackelford

  2. Rochester, MI, USA

    Viviana A. Weekes-Shackelford

Section Editor information

  1. Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada

    Farid Pazhoohi

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Garza, R. (2020). Male-Male Competition. In: Shackelford, T., Weekes-Shackelford, V. (eds) Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_1407-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_1407-1

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-16999-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-16999-6

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