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65 results for “Social cues”
MRI data of 40 adult participants in response to a cue induced craving task following food fasting, social isolation and baseline (within-subject design)
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Collective synchrony of mating signals modulated by ecological cues and social signals in bioluminescent sea fireflies
<p><span>Individuals often employ simple rules that can emergently synchronise behaviour. Some collective behaviours are intuitively beneficial, but others like mate signalling in leks occur across taxa despite theoretical individual costs. Whether disparate instances of synchronous signalling are similarly organised is unknown, largely due to challenges observing many individuals simultaneously. Recording field collectives and <em>ex situ</em> playback experiments, we describe principles of synchronous bioluminescent signals produced by marine ostracods (Crustacea; Luxorina) that seem behaviorally convergent with terrestrial fireflies, and with whom they last shared a common ancestor over 500 mya. Like synchronous fireflies, groups of signalling males use visual cues (intensity and duration of light) to decide when to signal. Individual ostracods also modulate their signal based on the distance to nearest neighbours. During peak darkness, luminescent "waves" of synchronous displays emerge and ripple across the sea floor every ~60 seconds, but such periodicity decays within and between nights after the full moon. Our data reveal these bioluminescent aggregations are sensitive to both ecological and social light sources. Because the function of collective signals is difficult to dissect, evolutionary convergence, like in the synchronous visual displays of diverse arthropods, provides natural replicates to understand the generalities that produce emergent group behaviour.</span></p>
Food and social cues modulate reproductive development but not migratory behavior in a nomadic songbird, the Pine Siskin (Pinus spinus)
<p>Many animals rely on photoperiodic and non-photoperiodic environmental cues to gather information and appropriately time life history stages across the annual cycle, such as reproduction, molt, and migration. Here, we experimentally demonstrate that the reproductive physiology, but not migratory behavior, of captive Pine Siskins responds to both food and social cues during the spring migratory-breeding period. Pine Siskins are a nomadic finch with a highly flexible breeding schedule and, in the spring, free-living Pine Siskins can wander large geographic areas and opportunistically breed. To understand the importance of non-photoperiodic cues to the migratory-breeding transition, we maintained individually housed birds on either a standard or enriched diet in the presence of group-housed heterospecifics or conspecifics experiencing either the standard or enriched diet type. We measured body condition and reproductive development of all Pine Siskins and, among individually housed Pine Siskins, quantified nocturnal migratory restlessness. In group-housed birds, the enriched diet caused increases in body condition and, among females, promoted reproductive development. Among individually housed birds, female reproductive development differed between treatment groups whereas male reproductive development did not. Specifically, individually housed females showed greater reproductive development when presented with conspecifics compared to heterospecifics. The highest rate of female reproductive development, however, was observed amongst individually housed females provided the enriched diet and maintained with group-housed conspecifics on an enriched diet. Changes in nocturnal migratory restlessness did not vary by treatment group or sex. By manipulating both the physical and social environment, this study demonstrates how multiple environmental cues can affect the timing of transitions between life history stages with differential responses between sexes and between migratory and reproductive systems.</p>
Social information use about novel aposematic prey depends on the intensity of the observed cue
<p>Animals gather social information by observing the behavior of others, but how the intensity of observed cues influences decision-making is rarely investigated. This is crucial for understanding how social information influences ecological and evolutionary dynamics. For example, observing a predator's distaste of unpalatable prey can reduce predation by naïve birds, and help explain the evolution and maintenance of aposematic warning signals. However, previous studies have only used demonstrators that responded vigorously, showing intense beak-wiping after tasting prey. Therefore, here we conducted an experiment with blue tits (<em>Cyanistes caeruleus</em>) informed by variation in predator responses. First, we found that the response to unpalatable food varies greatly, with only few individuals performing intensive beak-wiping. We then tested how the intensity of beak-wiping influences observers' foraging choices using video-playback of a conspecific tasting a novel conspicuous prey item. Observers were provided social information from: (1) no distaste response, (2) a weak distaste response, or (3) a strong distaste response, and were then allowed to forage on evolutionarily novel (artificial) prey. Consistent with previous studies, we found that birds consumed fewer aposematic prey after seeing a strong distaste response, however a weak response did not influence foraging choices. Our results suggest that while beak-wiping is a salient cue, its information content may vary with cue intensity. Furthermore, the number of potential demonstrators in the predator population might be lower than previously thought, although determining how this influences social transmission of avoidance in the wild will require uncovering the effects of intermediate cue salience.</p>
Dataset, statistical analysis code, and supplementary material of juvenile ravens' responses towards acoustic cues of different social categories
<p>Social competence i.e., defined as the ability to adjust the expression of social behaviour to the available social information, is known to be influenced by early-life conditions. Brood size might be one of the factors determining such early conditions, particularly in species with extended parental care. We here tested in ravens, whether growing up in families of different sizes affects the chicks' responsiveness to social information. We experimentally manipulated the brood size of 20 captive raven families, creating either small or large families. Simulating dispersal, juveniles were separated from their parents and temporarily housed in one of two captive non-breeder groups. After five weeks of socialization, each raven was individually tested in a playback setting with food-associated calls from three social categories: sibling, familiar unrelated raven they were housed with, and unfamiliar unrelated raven from the other non-breeder aviary. We found that individuals reared in small families were more attentive than birds from large families, in particular towards the familiar unrelated peer. These results indicate that variation in family size during upbringing can affect how juvenile ravens value social information. Whether the observed attention patterns translate into behavioural preferences under daily life conditions remains to be tested in future studies.</p>
Data for: Similar environmental cues guide timing of breeding and seasonal shifts in songbird social structure
<p>Seasonally breeding animals often exhibit different social structures during non-breeding and breeding periods that coincide with seasonal environmental variation. Therefore, ongoing climate change may play an important role in determining the future structure of animal societies, especially if climate determines when seasonal shifts in social structure occur. However, we know little about the environmental cues that determine the timing of seasonal shifts in social structure, a lack of knowledge that contrasts with our well-defined knowledge of the environmental cues that trigger a shift to breeding physiology in seasonally breeding species. Here we tested whether the environmental cues that drive seasonal shifts in social structure are similar to those that determine timing of breeding in the red-backed fairywren (<em>Malurus melanocephalus</em>), an Australian songbird. Social network analyses revealed that social groups, which are highly territorial during the breeding season, interact in social "communities" on larger ranges during the non-breeding season. Interactions among non-breeding groups were related to rainfall, with more rainfall leading to reductions in home range size and fewer interactions among non-breeding social groups. Similarly, onset of breeding was also determined by rainfall during the non-breeding season, with greater rainfall leading to earlier breeding. These findings reveal that for some species, the cues that determine the timing of shifts in social structure across seasonal boundaries can be similar to those that determine timing of breeding. This study increases our understanding of how social structure and the selection pressures that result from different social structures might respond to changing climates.</p>
Individual variation in spawning migration timing in a salmonid fish—exploring roles of environmental and social cues
<p><span>Describing and explaining patterns of individual animal behaviors in situ, and their repeatability over the annual cycle, is an emerging field in ecology owing largely to advances in tagging technology. We describe individual movements of adult Sakhalin taimen, <em>Parahucho</em> <em>perryi</em>, an endangered salmonid fish, in the headwaters of a river in northern Japan during the spring spawning season over two years. Migration timing, separated into stages prior to, during, and following the spawning period, was found to be more consistent and repeatable for females than males. We hypothesized that the observed coordinated movement within seasons, and repeatability in migration timing across seasons, could result from 1) individual-specific responsiveness resulting from endogenous, biological traits that are mediated by environmental factors, or 2) social interactions among comigrating individuals. We found that water temperature and water level experienced by fish near the river mouth approximately a week before arrival at the spawning ground explained variability in run timing between years for females but not males. We found no evidence of conspecific attraction or repulsion resulting from social interactions among the spawners and post-spawners. We conclude that individual-specific responsiveness to environmental cues was the likely mechanism underpinning the observed migration timing and movement patterns.</span></p>
Dataset, statistical analysis code, and supplementary material of juvenile ravens' responses towards acoustic cues of different social categories
Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.
Collective synchrony of mating signals modulated by ecological cues and social signals in bioluminescent sea fireflies
Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.
Food and social cues modulate reproductive development but not migratory behavior in a nomadic songbird, the Pine Siskin (Pinus spinus)
Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.
Individual variation in spawning migration timing in a salmonid fish—exploring roles of environmental and social cues
Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.
Social information use about novel aposematic prey depends on the intensity of the observed cue
Open the record for dataset details and reuse information.
Data from: A marine predator relies on both social cues and frequently updated memory to search for prey
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Data from: The evolutionary origins of natural pedagogy: Rhesus monkeys show sustained attention following nonsocial cues versus social communicative signals
<p>The natural pedagogy hypothesis proposes that human infants preferentially attend to communicative signals from others, facilitating rapid cultural learning. In this view, sensitivity to such signals are a uniquely human adaptation and as such nonhuman animals should not produce or utilize these communicative signals. We test these evolutionary predictions by examining sensitivity to communicative cues in 206 rhesus monkeys (<i>Macaca mulatta</i>) using an expectancy looking time task modeled on prior work with infants. Monkeys observed a human actor who either made eye contact and vocalized to the monkey (<i>social cue</i>), or waved a fruit in front of her face and produced a tapping sound (<i>nonsocial cue</i>). The actor then either looked at an object (<i>referential look</i>) or looked towards empty space (<i>look away</i>). We found that, unlike human infants in analogous situations, rhesus monkeys looked longer at events following nonsocial cues, regardless of the demonstrator's subsequent looking behavior. Moreover, younger and older monkeys showed similar patterns of responses across development. These results provide support for the natural pedagogy hypothesis, while also highlighting evolutionary changes in human sensitivity to communicative signals.</p>
Data from: Quantitative genetics of the use of conspecific and heterospecific social cues for breeding site choice
<p>Social information use for decision-making is common and affects ecological and evolutionary processes, including social aggregation, species coexistence and cultural evolution. Despite increasing ecological knowledge on social information use, very little is known about its genetic basis and therefore its evolutionary potential. Genetic variation in a trait affecting an individual's social and non-social environment may have important implications for population dynamics, interspecific interactions and for expression of other, environmentally plastic traits. We estimated repeatability, additive genetic variance and heritability of the use of conspecific and heterospecific social cues (abundance and breeding success) for breeding site choice in a population of wild collared flycatchers Ficedula albicollis. Repeatability was found for two social cues: previous year conspecific breeding success and previous year heterospecific abundance. Yet, additive genetic variances for these two social cues, and thus heritabilities, were low. This suggests that most of the phenotypic variation in the use of social cues and resulting conspecific and heterospecific social environment experienced by individuals in this population stems from phenotypic plasticity. Given the important role of social information use on ecological and evolutionary processes, more studies on genetic versus environmental determinism of social information use are needed.</p>
Experimentally-seeded social cues in the wild: Costs to bearers and potential benefits to receivers
<p>Conspecifics can provide social cues about the presence of key features of the surrounding environment, such as food or predators. Attending to social cues may therefore potentially benefit receivers, or at least be worth following. Yet, bearing social cues could also be costly, particularly if it increases the likelihood of close-range interaction with non-kin. Here, we experimentally-seeded social cues in the wild onto focal individuals of the social hermit crab (<em>Coenobita compressus</em>), testing (1) the 'potential benefits to receivers' hypothesis, which predicts that receivers will follow social cues to orient towards valuable resources, and (2) the 'costs to bearers' hypothesis, which predicts that bearers of social cues will experience direct (physical) costs or indirect (constrained movement) costs due to interaction with receivers. Consistent with hypothesis (1), in natural encounters, conspecifics that crossed paths frequently made antennal contact, potentially gathering social information at close range. In experiments, naïve conspecifics followed focal individuals bearing 'positive' social cues (about a valuable food resource) significantly more often than they followed individuals bearing less attractive ('neutral' or 'ambivalent') social cues, pointing to a potential benefit. Consistent with hypothesis (2), individuals bearing positive social cues incurred greater direct and indirect costs, being physically flipped more often and achieving shorter displacements compared to individuals bearing other social cues. We conclude that experimentally-seeded social cues in the wild can confer costs to bearers and potentially benefit receivers. Broadly, the costs of bearing social cues, revealed here, underscore the importance of not overlooking that social cues may be costly.</p>
Wild zebra finches are attracted towards acoustic cues from conspecific social groups
<p class="Normal1">Social information gathered by observing others often supplements personal information collected from direct interactions with the physical environment during decision making. Social information use may be particularly beneficial in harsh environments or if resources are distributed patchily, ephemeral and unpredictable, and hence difficult to locate. We experimentally tested the use of acoustic cues in wild zebra finches (<em>Taeniopygia guttata</em>) as they flew around their arid habitat as a way of locating conspecifics on the ground, and potentially accessing useful social information. Joining a conspecific group may reduce the predation risk, and if they are foraging may also improve foraging efficiency, as the distribution of zebra finch food (grass seed) is scattered and unpredictable in their natural habitat, the Australian arid zone. We conducted playback experiments along vegetated creek lines radiating out from an artificial dam where all birds in the population were coming for drinking water. We broadcast recordings of vocalizations from foraging conspecific groups to birds using these creek lines to move to or from the water into the wider habitat. Zebra finches were more likely to land near the loudspeaker when conspecific vocalizations were broadcast compared to white noise. Birds flying low and close to the loudspeaker were most likely to land. Our results indicate that zebra finches use acoustic cues of conspecifics as a source of social information for grouping decisions. Use of such information may also enhance foraging efficiency in environments with unpredictable and scarce foraging locations, and reduce predation risk for calling and responding individuals.</p>
Alarm cues and alarmed conspecifics: Neural activity during social learning from different cues in Trinidadian guppies
<p>Learning to respond appropriately to novel dangers is often essential to survival and success, but carries risks. Learning about novel threats from others (social learning) can reduce these risks. Many species, including the Trinidadian guppy (<em>Poecilia reticulata</em>), respond defensively to both conspecific chemical alarm cues and conspecifix anti-predator behaviours, and in other fish such social information can lead to a learned aversion to novel threats. However, relatively little is known about the neural substrates underlying social learning and the degree to which different forms of learning share similar neural mechanisms. Here, we explored the neural substrates mediating social learning of novel threats from two different conspecific cues (i.e. social cue-based threat learning). We first demonstrated that guppies rapidly learn about threats paired with either alarm cues or with conspecific threat responses (demonstration). Then, focusing on acquisition rather than recall, we discovered that phospho-S6 expression, a marker of neural activity, was elevated in guppies during learning from alarm cues in the putative homologue of the mammalian lateral septum and the preoptic area. Surprisingly, these changes in neural activity were not observed in fish learning from conspecific demonstration. Together, these results implicate forebrain areas in social learning about threat but raise the possibility that circuits contribute to such learning in a stimulus-specific manner.</p>
Neural and visual processing of social gaze cueing in typical and ASD adults
<p>Atypical eye gaze in joint attention is a clinical characteristic of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Despite this documented symptom, neural processing of joint attention tasks in real-life social interactions is not understood. To address this knowledge gap, functional-near infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) and eye-tracking data were acquired simultaneously as ASD and typically developed (TD) individuals engaged in a gaze-directed joint attention task with a live human and robot partner. We test the hypothesis that face processing deficits in ASD are greater for interactive faces than for simulated (robot) faces. Consistent with prior findings, neural responses during human gaze cueing modulated by face visual dwell time resulted in increased activity of ventral frontal regions in ASD and dorsal parietal systems in TD participants. Hypoactivity of the right dorsal parietal area during live human gaze cueing was correlated with autism spectrum symptom severity: Brief Observations of Symptoms of Autism (BOSA) scores (r = -0.86). Contrarily, neural activity in response to robot gaze cueing modulated by visual acquisition factors activated dorsal parietal systems in ASD, and this neural activity was not related to autism symptom severity (r = 0.06). These results are consistent with the hypothesis that altered encoding of incoming facial information to the dorsal parietal cortex is specific to live human faces in ASD. These findings open new directions for understanding joint attention difficulties in ASD by providing a connection between superior parietal lobule activity and live interaction with human faces.</p>
Effects of early predation and social cues on the relationship between laterality and personality in the Threespined stickleback
<p>Individual differences in laterality and personality are expected to covary, as emotions are processed differently by the two hemispheres and personality involves emotional behavior. Fish species are often used to investigate this topic due to the large variability in personality and laterality patterns. While some species show a positive relationship between lateralization strength and boldness, others show a negative relationship, and some show no relationship. To investigate whether this relationship follows changes in laterality and personality, we conducted a fully factorial design experiment manipulating predation and group size during early development. Results showed that the strength of laterality was influenced by predation threat, while social tendency and boldness were influenced by group size. These findings suggest that early life conditions can have an impact on laterality and social behavior. The relationship between laterality and personality traits, while present, was heavily influenced by the specific trial conditions, but not by the different developmental conditions.</p>
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Allen Brain Atlas
Allen Brain Atlas is an Allen Institute collection of brain map atlases, datasets, APIs, and analysis tools covering mouse, human, and non-human primate brain resources.
Annotated Behaviour and Observability Dataset (ABODe)
ABODe is a University of Edinburgh DataShare dataset for behavior classification in group-housed mice using home-cage video, identities, bounding boxes, ground-plate positions, and annotator labels.
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The International Brain Laboratory public data releases expose standardized mouse decision-making experiments, including Neuropixels recordings, widefield calcium imaging, behavior, and session metadata accessed through the ONE API.
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