Predicting complex species-environment interactions is crucial for guiding conservation and mitigation strategies in a dynamically changing world. Phenotypic plasticity is a mechanism of trait variation that determines how individuals and populations adapt to changing and novel environments. For individuals, the effects of phenotypic plasticity can be quantified by measuring environment–trait relationships, but it is often difficult to predict how phenotypic plasticity affects populations. The assumption that environment–trait relationships validated for individuals indicate how populations respond to environmental change is commonly made without sufficient justification. Here we derive a novel general mathematical framework linking trait variation due to phenotypic plasticity to population dynamics. Applying the framework to the classical example of Nicholson's blowflies, we show how seemingly sensible predictions made from environment–trait relationships do not generalise to population responses. As a consequence, trait-based analyses that do not incorporate population feedbacks risk mischaracterising the effect of environmental change on populations.

中文翻译：

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表型可塑性作为种群动态的原因和结果

预测复杂的物种-环境相互作用对于在动态变化的世界中指导保护和缓解策略至关重要。表型可塑性是性状变异的一种机制，它决定了个体和群体如何适应不断变化的新环境。对于个体而言，表型可塑性的影响可以通过测量环境-特征关系来量化，但通常很难预测表型可塑性如何影响种群。对个体验证的环境特征关系表明人口如何应对环境变化的假设通常是在没有充分理由的情况下做出的。在这里，我们推导出一个新的通用数学框架，将由于表型可塑性引起的性状变异与种群动态联系起来。将该框架应用于尼科尔森的苍蝇的经典例子，我们展示了从环境-特征关系做出的看似明智的预测如何不能推广到种群反应。因此，不包含人口反馈的基于特征的分析可能会错误地描述环境变化对人口的影响。