Servedio, M.R. and Sæther, S.A. and Sætre, G.-P. (2009)
Reinforcement and learning. Evolutionary Ecology, 23, 109-123.
ISSN 0269-7653. Restricted to KNAW only Official URL:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10682-007-9188-2 Evidence has been
accumulating to support the process of reinforcement as a
potential mechanism in speciation. In many species, mate choice
decisions are influenced by cultural factors, including learned
mating preferences (sexual imprinting) or learned mate
attraction signals (e.g., bird song). It has been postulated
that learning can have a strong impact on the likelihood of
speciation and perhaps on the process of reinforcement, but no
models have explicitly considered learning in a reinforcement
context. We review the evidence that suggests that learning may
be involved in speciation and reinforcement, and present a model
of reinforcement via learned preferences. We show that not only
can reinforcement occur when preferences are learned by
imprinting, but that such preferences can maintain sp