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. 2020 Aug 19;14(1):248-267.
doi: 10.1111/eva.13065. eCollection 2021 Jan.

Socio-eco-evolutionary dynamics in cities

Simone Des Roches  1 , Kristien I Brans  2 , Max R Lambert  3 , L Ruth Rivkin  4   5   6 , Amy Marie Savage  7 , Christopher J Schell  8 , Cristian Correa  9   10 , Luc De Meester  2   11   12 , Sarah E Diamond  13 , Nancy B Grimm  14 , Nyeema C Harris  15 , Lynn Govaert  16   17 , Andrew P Hendry  18 , Marc T J Johnson  4   5   6 , Jason Munshi-South  19 , Eric P Palkovacs  20 , Marta Szulkin  21 , Mark C Urban  22 , Brian C Verrelli  23 , Marina Alberti  1
Affiliations

Socio-eco-evolutionary dynamics in cities

Simone Des Roches et al. Evol Appl. .

Abstract

Cities are uniquely complex systems regulated by interactions and feedbacks between nature and human society. Characteristics of human society-including culture, economics, technology and politics-underlie social patterns and activity, creating a heterogeneous environment that can influence and be influenced by both ecological and evolutionary processes. Increasing research on urban ecology and evolutionary biology has coincided with growing interest in eco-evolutionary dynamics, which encompasses the interactions and reciprocal feedbacks between evolution and ecology. Research on both urban evolutionary biology and eco-evolutionary dynamics frequently focuses on contemporary evolution of species that have potentially substantial ecological-and even social-significance. Still, little work fully integrates urban evolutionary biology and eco-evolutionary dynamics, and rarely do researchers in either of these fields fully consider the role of human social patterns and processes. Because cities are fundamentally regulated by human activities, are inherently interconnected and are frequently undergoing social and economic transformation, they represent an opportunity for ecologists and evolutionary biologists to study urban "socio-eco-evolutionary dynamics." Through this new framework, we encourage researchers of urban ecology and evolution to fully integrate human social drivers and feedbacks to increase understanding and conservation of ecosystems, their functions and their contributions to people within and outside cities.

Keywords: adaptation; anthropogenic; coupled human–natural systems; eco‐evo; socio‐ecological systems; urbanization.

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Conflict of interest statement

None declared.

Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
Urban ecosystems provide an opportunity to study contemporary evolution and ecological change inherent in eco‐evolutionary dynamics (yellow arrows). Eco‐evolutionary dynamics in urban ecosystems are strongly linked to human society. Characteristics of human society likely drive (blue arrows) and are impacted by (white arrows) ecological and evolutionary change
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
Detailed dynamics among social, ecological and evolutionary patterns and processes in urban systems. Social patterns and processes (a) encompass a diversity of political, economic, and technological drivers that are interrelated with transportation and infrastructure, culture and education, human population demographics, and land/resource use and management. Social drivers affect (b) ecology through habitat modification; (c) ecology (biotic interactions) and evolution (gene flow and genetic drift) through altering connectivity among habitats; and (d) ecology and evolution through selection for preferred genotypes and phenotypes. Ecological (e) and evolutionary (f) dynamics are linked through feedbacks between ecosystems, communities, populations, genotypes and phenotypes. Ecological and evolutionary feedbacks towards society take the form of nature’s contributions to people (g) including ecosystem services and disservices
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