Ecological and Life‐History Correlates of Incubation Attentiveness Differ Between Female‐Only and Biparentally Incubating Passerine Birds

ABSTRACT Aim Avian incubation attentiveness exhibits global patterns with respect to gradients of ecological and life‐history characteristics. However, the factors contributing to the patterns remain inadequately understood. Here, we aim to examine how life‐history and ecological factors are associated with incubation attentiveness and its latitudinal pattern, with a particular emphasis on the mediating roles of parental incubation mode (female‐only vs. biparental incubation) and nest structure. Location Global. Time Period 1912–2021. Major Taxa Studied Passeriformes. Methods Using data from 466 populations of 307 passerine species (52 biparentally incubating species and 255 female‐only incubating species), we applied Bayesian phylogenetic mixed models to test how incubation mode and nest structure mediate the relationships between incubation attentiveness and other ecological and life‐history traits by examining their interactions with those traits. Results Biparentally incubating species showed higher incubation attentiveness than female‐only incubating species, and the relationships between incubation attentiveness and some other factors (e.g., ambient temperature and absolute latitude) differed between them. In biparentally incubating species, nest attentiveness decreased with ambient temperature and increased with body mass, whereas in female‐only incubating species, it increased with absolute latitude. Nest structure did not affect the relationships between incubation attentiveness and other factors, but in female‐only incubating species, domed‐nesters showed a significantly lower attentiveness than open‐ and cavity‐nesters, with no difference between the latter two. Additionally, female‐only incubating species breeding in the Southern Hemisphere showed lower incubation attentiveness than those in the Northern Hemisphere. Clutch size had no detectable effect on incubation attentiveness. Main Conclusions Our findings demonstrate that parental incubation mode interacts with ecological and life‐history drivers to shape global incubation attentiveness patterns in passerine birds. By modulating species' responses to temperature and latitudinal gradients, parental strategies structure macroecological variation in avian reproduction.