Theoretical perspectives on reproductive aging

Abstract

Age patterns of female reproduction vary widely among iteroparous animal species with determinate growth. Often fertility declines with age, but in other cases, it may be flat or rise across age. Sometimes fertility ceases altogether, leaving a substantial post-reproductive life span. In this article, we discuss theories that may provide some insights into how these diverse patterns might evolve. We present a simple optimal life history model and consider circumstances in which fertility might rise or fall with age. In our model, without assuming that costs per birth rise with age, that foraging efficiency declines, or that net intergenerational transfers increase, we find that optimal fertility would tend to rise rather than decline. This happens because less energy would be allocated to survival at older ages, leaving more to allocate to fertility. In our analysis, optimal fertility could decline at older ages when an older female makes heavy net intergenerational transfers to multiple offspring or grandoffspring, reducing resources for her own reproduction. This pattern is more likely to evolve when costs of fertility at older ages are higher, when costs of reducing juvenile mortality are low, and when the level of juvenile mortality is high. We also derive conditions for the evolution of menopause, for determinate growth, and for juvenile mortality that declines with age. The optimal life history can exhibit a variety of age patterns of fertility, rising, flat, or falling, depending on the constraints and opportunities faced.