Metadata for studies from meta-analysis investigating covariance between genetic and environmental (CovGE) effects in phenotypic results

Abstract

Covariance can exist between the genetic and environmental influences on phenotype (CovGE) and can have an important role in ecological and evolutionary processes in nature and population responses to environmental change. CovGE is commonly called countergradient variation (CnGV; negative CovGE)or cogradient variation (CoGV; positive CovGE)and has been recognized in classic studies that have established several long-standing hypotheses about CnGV and CoGV. For instance, it is hypothesized that CnGV is more prevalent in nature than CoGV, that CnGV is more prevalent in fish, amphibian, and invertebrate taxa, across latitudinal or altitudinal environmental gradients, and more frequently occurs in metabolic compensation traits, including development, growth, feeding, metabolism, and activity, while CoGV is more commonly observed in morphological traits. The recent development of a standardized method to measure CovGE allows for the first rigorous quantitative exploration of these hypotheses. We use meta-analysis and apply the novel quantitative method to test whether the above hypotheses are supported in the literature. We found no differences in frequency of CnGV and CoGV, and no systematic patterns relative to taxa, environmental gradient, or trait type. However, our analyses suggest that CovGE may be as common as gene by environment (GxE) interactions. Given that CovGE is likely to have a strong impact on future outcomes for organisms experiencing environmental change, that significant CovGE occurred frequently, and the lack of systematic patterns in the occurrence of CovGE, we encourage a more widespread application of measuring CovGE.

For a complete list of measurements, refer to the full dataset description in the supplemental file 'Dataset_description.pdf'. The most current version of this dataset is available at: https://www.bco-dmo.org/dataset/877414