Predicting population responses to environmental change from individual-level mechanisms: towards a standardized mechanistic approach

Abstract

Animal populations will mediate the response of global biodiversity to environmental changes. Population models are thus important tools for both understanding and predicting animal responses to uncertain future conditions. Most approaches, however, are correlative and ignore the individual-level mechanisms that give rise to population dynamics. Here, we assess several existing population modelling approaches and find limitations to both ‘correlative’ and ‘mechanistic’ models. We advocate the need for a standardized mechanistic approach for linking individual mechanisms (physiology, behaviour, and evolution) to population dynamics in spatially explicit landscapes. Such an approach is potentially more flexible and informative than current population models. Key to realizing this goal, however, is overcoming current data limitations, the development and testing of eco-evolutionary theory to represent interactions between individual mechanisms, and standardized multi-dimensional environmental change scenarios which incorporate multiple stressors. Such progress is essential in supporting environmental decisions in uncertain future conditions.