Laboratório de Biologia Marinha e Conservação, Universidade Federal de Alagoas, Cidade Universitária 57072-900, Maceió, AL, Brazil.
Cetacean Ecology Research Group, Massey University, Albany, AKL 0745, New Zealand.
Science. 2021 Jul 2;373(6550):56-60. doi: 10.1126/science.abh0945.
Human activities are changing our environment. Along with climate change and a widespread loss of biodiversity, plastic pollution now plays a predominant role in altering ecosystems globally. Here, we review the occurrence of plastic ingestion by wildlife through evolutionary and ecological lenses and address the fundamental question of why living organisms ingest plastic. We unify evolutionary, ecological, and cognitive approaches under the evolutionary trap theory and identify three main factors that may drive plastic ingestion: (i) the availability of plastics in the environment, (ii) an individual's acceptance threshold, and (iii) the overlap of cues given by natural foods and plastics.
人类活动正在改变我们的环境。随着气候变化和生物多样性的广泛丧失，塑料污染现在在改变全球生态系统方面起着主导作用。在这里，我们从进化和生态的角度回顾了野生动物摄入塑料的情况，并探讨了生物体为什么会摄入塑料这一基本问题。我们将进化、生态和认知方法统一在进化陷阱理论下，并确定了可能导致塑料摄入的三个主要因素：（i）环境中塑料的可用性，（ii）个体的接受阈值，以及（iii）天然食物和塑料发出的线索重叠。
