Phenotypic traits are often integrated into evolutionary modules: sets of organismal parts that evolve together. In social insect colonies the concepts of integration and modularity apply to sets of traits both within and among functionally and phenotypically differentiated castes. On macroevolutionary timescales, patterns of integration and modularity within and across castes can be clues to the selective and ecological factors shaping their evolution and diversification. We develop a set of hypotheses describing contrasting patterns of...

Understanding how climate-mediated biotic interactions shape thermal niche width is critical in an era of global change. Yet, most previous work on thermal niches has ignored detailed mechanistic information about the relationship between temperature and organismal performance, which can be described by a thermal performance curve. Here, we develop a model that predicts the width of thermal performance curves will be narrower in the presence of interspecific competitors, causing a species’ optimal breeding temperature to...

Although dominance hierarchies occur in most societies, our understanding of how these power structures influence individual investment in cooperative and competitive behaviors remains elusive. Both conflict and cooperation in animal societies are often environmentally-regulated, yet how individuals alter their cooperative and competitive investments as environmental quality changes remains unclear. Using game theoretic modeling, we predict that individuals of all ranks will invest more in cooperation and less in social conflict in harsh environments than individuals...