Underappreciated Consequences of Phenotypic Plasticity for Ecological Speciation
Figure 2
Effects of adaptive plasticity on colonization and adaptation to a new niche. A population well adapted to its niche is illustrated in (a) by coincidence of the mean trait value (black line) with the peak of the fitness function (dashed line). If the fitness function is dramatically different in a new environment, a population with trait values favored in the old environment (b) might have such low fitness as to have little chance of survival. If environmental induction produces a shift in trait values toward higher fitness phenotypes (c), the population might persist but still experience selection. If phenotypic plasticity results in a perfect match between mean trait value and fitness optimum (d), then there is no effect of selection on the population mean.
