Conflicting social norms and community conservation compliance

Though the success of conservation initiatives relies on changing behaviour, little social psychological research has examined factors such as attitudes and social norms in the context of actual conservation campaigns. In the context of reducing light pollution around sea turtle nesting habitats, researching technological solutions has clear merit. Problems such as light glow are, however, fundamentally about human behaviour, and so finding ways to effect behavioural change is critical. Social norms, or perceptions about what other people think and do, have been widely used in behaviour change campaigns across various domains, including campaigns to promote conservation behaviour. Here, we investigate how the norms of different groups may influence our behaviour in the context of a campaign to alter behavioural norms about light glow pollution in a community. We examine attitudes, social norms, and the degree of conflict (versus congruence) between the behaviours of different groups, and their relationship with intentions to engage in conservation behaviours relevant to sea turtle conservation. We show that attitudes and norms are related to behavioural intentions, and conflicts between social norms influence intentions, over and above the norms themselves. This highlights an important consideration for conservation campaigns utilising social norms-based behaviour change appeals.     

The role of mate‐choice copying in speciation and hybridization

Mate‐choice copying, a social, non‐genetic mechanism of mate choice, occurs when an individual (typically a female) copies the mate choice of other individuals via a process of social learning. Over the past 20 years, mate‐choice copying has consistently been shown to affect mate choice in several species, by altering the genetically based expression of mating preferences. This behaviour has been claimed by several authors to have a significant role in evolution. Because it can cause or increase skews in male mating success, it seems to have the potential to induce a rapid change of the directionality and rate of sexual selection, possibly leading to divergent evolution and speciation. Theoretical work has, however, been challenging this view, showing that copying may decelerate sexual selection and that linkage disequilibrium cannot be established between the copied preference and the male trait, because females copy from unrelated individuals in the population, making an invasion of new and potentially fitter male traits difficult. Given this controversy, it is timely to ask about the real impact of mate‐choice copying in speciation. We propose that a solution to this impasse may be the existence of some degree of habitat selection, which would create a spatial structure, causing scenarios of micro‐allopatry and thus overcoming the problem of the lack of linkage disequilibrium. As far as we are aware, the potential role of mate‐choice copying on fostering speciation in micro‐allopatry has not been tackled. Also important is that the role of mate‐choice copying has generally been discussed as being a barrier to gene flow. However, in our view, mate‐choice copying may actually play a key role in facilitating gene flow, thereby fostering hybridization. Yet, the role of mate‐choice copying in hybridization has so far been overlooked, although the conditions under which it might occur are more likely, or less restricted, than those favouring speciation. Hence, a conceptual framework is needed to identify the exact mechanisms and the conditions under which speciation or hybridization are expected. Here, we develop such a framework to be used as a roadmap for future research at the intersection of these research areas.     

Male aggressiveness in a polygynous ungulate varies with social and ecological context

Aggression is a social behaviour which can be affected by numerous factors. The quality and quantity of food resources may play an important role in the aggressiveness of territorial ungulates as the defence of these resources influences female choice and mating opportunities. However, the relationship between food resources and aggression remains poorly understood. We assessed the ecological and social factors that influence aggression in Lama guanicoe, a territorial ungulate exhibiting resource‐defence polygyny, during three periods (group‐formation, mating and post‐mating) in the reproductive seasons of 2014 and 2016. We recorded 460 focal observations of territorial (family groups, solitary) and non‐territorial (mixed and bachelor groups) males. We performed analyses at the population level (including all focal observations) and at the group level (each social unit separately), to test whether the factors that influence aggression differ at these different scales. We also identified proxies of vegetation quality as potential predictors of aggression. At the population level, we found that the presence of aggressive behaviour peaked during the mating season and that post‐mating aggression may have been driven by inter‐annual environmental variations. For family groups and solitary males, variables reflecting high vegetation quality/quantity were predictors of aggressive behaviour, reflecting the resource‐defence strategy of this species. Conversely, for mixed‐group males, aggression may be more associated with social instability and group size, although this hypothesis has yet to be tested. Our research reinforces the idea that aggression can occur in multiple contexts depending on male status (e.g. territorial or non‐territorial) and contributes to our understanding of how ecological (i.e. availability of food resources) and social factors influence aggression in a territorial ungulate.     

Personality and social context

There has been considerable interest among biologists in the phenomenon of non‐human animal personality in recent years. Consistent variations among individuals in their behavioural responses to ecologically relevant stimuli, often relating to a trade‐off between level of risk and reward, have been recorded in a wide variety of species, representing many animal taxa. Research into behavioural variation among individuals has major implications for our understanding of ecological patterns and processes at scales from the level of the individual to the level of the population. Until recently, however, many studies that have considered the broader ecological implications of animal personality have failed to take into account the crucial moderating effect of social context. It is well documented that social processes, such as conformity and facilitation, exert considerable influence on the behaviour of grouping animals and hence that isolated individuals may often behave in a qualitatively as well as quantitatively different manner to those in groups. Recently, a number of studies have begun to address aspects of this gap in our knowledge and have provided vital insights. In this review we examine the state of our knowledge on the relationship between individual personality and sociality. In doing so we consider the influence of the social context on individual personality responses, the interaction between the collective personalities of group members and the expression of those personalities in the individual, and the influence of the personalities of group members on group structure and function. We propose key areas of focus for future studies in order to develop our understanding of this fundamentally important area.     

Disruptive physiology: olfaction and the microbiome–gut–brain axis

This review covers the field of olfaction and chemosensation of odorants and puts this information into the context of interactions between microbes and behaviour; the microbiome–gut–brain axis (MGBA). Recent emphasis has also been placed on the concept of the holobiome which states that no single aspect of an organism should be viewed separately and thus must include examination of their associated microbial populations and their influence. While it is known that the microbiome may be involved in the modulation of animal behaviour, there has been little systematized effort to incorporate into such studies the rapidly developing knowledge of the wide range of olfactory systems. The classical olfactory system is evolutionarily conserved in multiple taxa from insects through to fish, reptiles and mammals, and is represented by the largest gene families in vertebrates. Mice have over 1000 different olfactory receptors and humans about 400. They are distributed throughout the body and are even found in spermatozoa where they function in chemotaxis. Each olfactory receptor has the unique functional capability of high‐affinity binding to several different molecular ligands. These and other properties render the cataloguing of odorants (odorome) with specific actions a difficult task. Some ectopic olfactory receptors have been shown to have functional effects in the gut and kidney, highlighting the complexity of the systems engaged by odorants. However, there are, in addition to classical olfactory receptors, at least two other families of receptors involved in olfaction that are also widely found expressed on tissues in many different organs in addition to the nervous system and brain: the trace‐amine associated and formyl peptide receptors. Bacteria can make many if not most odorants and are responsible for recognition of species and relative relatedness, as well as predator presence, among many other examples. Activation of different combinations of olfactory receptors by bacterial products such as β‐phenylethylamine have been shown even to control expression of emotions such as fear and aggression. The number of examples of bacterial products and volatile odorants influencing brain function and behaviour is expanding rapidly. Since it is recognized that many different bacterial products and metabolites also function as social cues, and may themselves be directly or indirectly causative of behavioural change, it becomes ever more important to include olfaction into studies of the MGBA. Clearly there are broader implications for the involvement of olfaction in this rapidly evolving field. These include improvement in our understanding of the pathways engaged in various behaviours, and the identification of novel approaches and new targets in efforts to modulate behavioural changes.     

Partial preferential chromosome pairing is genotype dependent in tetraploid rose

It has long been recognised that polyploid species do not always neatly fall into the categories of auto‐ or allopolyploid, leading to the term ‘segmental allopolyploid’ to describe everything in between. The meiotic behaviour of such intermediate species is not fully understood, nor is there consensus as to how to model their inheritance patterns. In this study we used a tetraploid cut rose (Rosa hybrida) population, genotyped using the 68K WagRhSNP array, to construct an ultra‐high‐density linkage map of all homologous chromosomes using methods previously developed for autotetraploids. Using the predicted bivalent configurations in this population we quantified differences in pairing behaviour among and along homologous chromosomes, leading us to correct our estimates of recombination frequency to account for this behaviour. This resulted in the re‐mapping of 25 695 SNP markers across all homologues of the seven rose chromosomes, tailored to the pairing behaviour of each chromosome in each parent. We confirmed the inferred differences in pairing behaviour among chromosomes by examining repulsion‐phase linkage estimates, which also carry information about preferential pairing and recombination. Currently, the closest sequenced relative to rose is Fragaria vesca. Aligning the integrated ultra‐dense rose map with the strawberry genome sequence provided a detailed picture of the synteny, confirming overall co‐linearity but also revealing new genomic rearrangements. Our results suggest that pairing affinities may vary along chromosome arms, which broadens our current understanding of segmental allopolyploidy.     

Wheel-running activity: a new interpretation

The wheel-running activity of caged mammals has been misinterpreted for many years as a measure of 'general activity'. A review of the literature and recent experimental evidence suggests that this behaviour has a far more specific function for the animal, and that its major and invaluable experimental use lies as both a field and laboratory tool for the studies of particular forms of migration. This new interpretation allows a greater understanding of the motivations underlying this widely-monitored behaviour.

Summary

It is apparent that the nature of the response to an activity-wheel has been greatly misunderstood for many years. The behaviour appears to be far more specific than previously thought, reflecting a type of inherent response which is not evident when activity is recorded by other methods. This report indicates that the wheel is used by a caged animal when the individual is motivated to reach an unattainable resource. This results in an urge to travel, either to remove itself from the immediate area, or to search for specific resources. It is proposed that when the goal is perceptually not present, the activity wheel is a specific monitor of 'exploratory migration', and reflects the urge to collect information about the location of resources. It implies, therefore, that the use of the activity-wheel as a simple measure of 'general activity' should cease; the major future uses of this particular activity recording device should be in the studies of the daily, ontogenetic and seasonal variation in the incidence of exploratory migration, and the influence upon it of other environ- mental factors, as well as a method of investigating goal-orientation, both in the field and the laboratory. This new interpretation provides a more precise explanation of what is being measured in wheel-running experiments, and should result in a more specific use of wheel-activity in experimentation.     

Microsatellite markers reveal the potential for kin selection on black grouse leks

The evolution of social behaviour has puzzled biologists since Darwin. Since Hamilton''s theoretical work in the 1960s it has been realized that social behaviour may evolve through the effects of kinship. By helping relatives, an individual may pass on its genes despite negative effects on its own reproduction. Leks are groups of males that females visit primarily to mate. The selective advantage for males to join such social groups has been given much recent attention, but no clear picture has yet emerged. Here we show, using microsatellite analysis, that males but not females of a lekking bird (the black grouse, Tetrao tetrix) are genetically structured at the lek level. We interpret this structuring to be the effects of strong natal philopatry in males. This has the consequence that males on any specific lek should be more related than expected by chance as indicated by our genetic data. Our results thus suggest that kin selection is a factor that needs to be considered in the evolution and maintenance of the lek mating system in black grouse and sheds new light on models of lek evolution.     

The impact of water pH on association preferences in fish

Acidification of lakes and rivers, as a consequence of anthropogenic interference, can cause fundamental changes to biological and ecological processes. One of the main consequences of a reduction in water pH for aquatic organisms is the disruption of their chemosensory abilities, as the detection of chemical cues underpins a wide range of decision‐making processes; for example, a reduction to low pH has been shown to interfere with predator avoidance and the detection of foraging cues. Moreover, aquatic organisms are known to make widespread use of chemical information to inform their social behaviour, although we have a comparably poor understanding of how this is impacted by water acidification, especially their shoaling behaviour. Using a standard behavioural assay, we therefore investigated the impact of low water pH on the social interactions mediated by diet‐derived chemical cues in three‐spined sticklebacks (Gasterosteus aculeatus), by quantifying social behaviour in water that varied either experimentally or naturally in pH. In both cases, we predicted that association patterns would be disrupted by low pH conditions, as reduced pH has shown to interfere with the perception of chemical cues in other non‐social contexts. Consistent with this prediction, our results demonstrate that an acute, short‐term reduction in water pH caused a breakdown in the diet‐mediated social interaction patterns seen in more alkaline water, although, interestingly, the pattern of associations for fish tested in naturally acidic water was both more complex and in a direction that was precisely contrary to our predictions. Overall, the findings provide insights into the potential effects of an acute reduction in water pH on fish communication and social interaction patterns, which may have implication for various individual, group, population and community‐level processes.     

Displacement Behaviour Solving a Silent Contradiction

Displacement acts, once a hot topic in ethology, but wrapped in silence for two decades since, have recently been suggested to indicate and relax social tension (Maestripieri et al., 1992; Wiepkema, 1987). The first of these contentions seems to be in contradiction with some of the classical ethological studies of displacement behaviour, in particular those supporting the disinhibition hypothesis, since the latter would not predict any positive correlation between amount of tension (i.c. intensity of the conflict) and the occurrence of displacement acts.A critical examination of these studies reveals that a positive correlation of the sort has been found, but that proponents of the disinhibition hypothesis tried to explain it in terms of their own model, rather than taking it at its face value. (The reason for this is that they viewed it as pleading for the surplus hypothesis which they rejected). It can be shown that at least some of their explanations are grounded on assumptions which are arbitrary. Also, the disinhibition hypothesis does not account for the occurrence of displacement behaviour in contexts with tension but without conflict.This discussion leads to a new interpretation of displacement behaviour, in which tension is the direct cause, whether generated by conflict or otherwise, and relaxation is brought about by a breaking of the cognitive symmetry between actors. It is indicated how this interpretation may be tested with experiments.     

A multilevel analytical framework for studying cultural evolution in prehistoric hunter–gatherer societies

Over the past decade, a major debate has taken place on the underpinnings of cultural changes in human societies. A growing array of evidence in behavioural and evolutionary biology has revealed that social connectivity among populations and within them affects, and is affected by, culture. Yet the interplay between prehistoric hunter–gatherer social structure and cultural transmission has typically been overlooked. Interestingly, the archaeological record contains large data sets, allowing us to track cultural changes over thousands of years: they thus offer a unique opportunity to shed light on long‐term cultural transmission processes. In this review, we demonstrate how well‐developed methods for social structure analysis can increase our understanding of the selective pressures underlying cumulative culture. We propose a multilevel analytical framework that considers finer aspects of the complex social structure in which regional groups of prehistoric hunter–gatherers were embedded. We put forward predictions of cultural transmission based on local‐ and global‐level network metrics of small‐scale societies and their potential effects on cumulative culture. By bridging the gaps between network science, palaeodemography and cultural evolution, we draw attention to the use of the archaeological record to depict patterns of social interactions and transmission variability. We argue that this new framework will contribute to improving our understanding of social interaction patterns, as well as the contexts in which cultural changes occur. Ultimately, this may provide insights into the evolution of human behaviour.     

Constructing a confidence interval for the fraction who benefit from treatment,using randomized trial data

The fraction who benefit from treatment is the proportion of patients whose potential outcome under treatment is better than that under control. Inference on this parameter is challenging since it is only partially identifiable, even in our context of a randomized trial. We propose a new method for constructing a confidence interval for the fraction, when the outcome is ordinal or binary. Our confidence interval procedure is pointwise consistent. It does not require any assumptions about the joint distribution of the potential outcomes, although it has the flexibility to incorporate various user‐defined assumptions. Our method is based on a stochastic optimization technique involving a second‐order, asymptotic approximation that, to the best of our knowledge, has not been applied to biomedical studies. This approximation leads to statistics that are solutions to quadratic programs, which can be computed efficiently using optimization tools. In simulation, our method attains the nominal coverage probability or higher, and can have narrower average width than competitor methods. We apply it to a trial of a new intervention for stroke.     

The role of the microbiome in the neurobiology of social behaviour

Microbes colonise all multicellular life, and the gut microbiome has been shown to influence a range of host physiological and behavioural phenotypes. One of the most intriguing and least understood of these influences lies in the domain of the microbiome's interactions with host social behaviour, with new evidence revealing that the gut microbiome makes important contributions to animal sociality. However, little is known about the biological processes through which the microbiome might influence host social behaviour. Here, we synthesise evidence of the gut microbiome's interactions with various aspects of host sociality, including sociability, social cognition, social stress, and autism. We discuss evidence of microbial associations with the most likely physiological mediators of animal social interaction. These include the structure and function of regions of the ‘social' brain (the amygdala, the prefrontal cortex, and the hippocampus) and the regulation of ‘social’ signalling molecules (glucocorticoids including corticosterone and cortisol, sex hormones including testosterone, oestrogens, and progestogens, neuropeptide hormones such as oxytocin and arginine vasopressin, and monoamine neurotransmitters such as serotonin and dopamine). We also discuss microbiome‐associated host genetic and epigenetic processes relevant to social behaviour. We then review research on microbial interactions with olfaction in insects and mammals, which contribute to social signalling and communication. Following these discussions, we examine evidence of microbial associations with emotion and social behaviour in humans, focussing on psychobiotic studies, microbe–depression correlations, early human development, autism, and issues of statistical power, replication, and causality. We analyse how the putative physiological mediators of the microbiome–sociality connection may be investigated, and discuss issues relating to the interpretation of results. We also suggest that other candidate molecules should be studied, insofar as they exert effects on social behaviour and are known to interact with the microbiome. Finally, we consider different models of the sequence of microbial effects on host physiological development, and how these may contribute to host social behaviour.     

Network-based diffusion analysis: a new method for detecting social learning

Social learning has been documented in a wide diversity of animals. In free-living animals, however, it has been difficult to discern whether animals learn socially by observing other group members or asocially by acquiring a new behaviour independently. We addressed this challenge by developing network-based diffusion analysis (NBDA), which analyses the spread of traits through animal groups and takes into account that social network structure directs social learning opportunities. NBDA fits agent-based models of social and asocial learning to the observed data using maximum-likelihood estimation. The underlying learning mechanism can then be identified using model selection based on the Akaike information criterion. We tested our method with artificially created learning data that are based on a real-world co-feeding network of macaques. NBDA is better able to discriminate between social and asocial learning in comparison with diffusion curve analysis, the main method that was previously applied in this context. NBDA thus offers a new, more reliable statistical test of learning mechanisms. In addition, it can be used to address a wide range of questions related to social learning, such as identifying behavioural strategies used by animals when deciding whom to copy.     

Spécificité des dilemmes éthiques résultant des travaux développés en neurosciences: émergence d’une neuroéthique

As neurosciences improve our knowledge about the brain for defining behaviour, medical ethics and social policy, what are the implications of new possibilities of technical intervention on our brain? Neuroethics defines a new field of ethics where scientists and ethicists, and also journalists and politicians, are beginning to reflect on social issues resulting from applications of the work of neuroscience in areas such as moral vision, decision-making, conduct and policies. It is likely that the potential application of new knowledge to human behaviour will generate a great deal of ethical and public policy concern in many aspects of everyday life, from child care and school programs to improvements or maintenance of adult capabilities. Neuroscience will also challenge social fields as diverse as forensic psychiatry, sports, corporate hiring and the judiciary. As neurosciences advance, it is important to have a framework that might help to guide the utilization of the new knowledge.     

Felsbilder im Lang‐Shan

In a recent polemic, Leda Cosmides and John Tooby offer new proposals to bridge the gulf between biological and cultural explanations of human behaviour. By focussing on the evolved architecture of the human mind, they seek specific psychological mechanisms by which genes may influence human social institutions. A major challenge for this approach is how to trace precisely which psychological endowments, formed by the Pleistocene age, have shaped which aspect of our contemporary cultures. Here it is suggested that the temporal framework of individual human lives may provide one means of establishing clearer connections between brain structure and social institutions. For biologists this will involve extending conventional views of human ontogeny to include the phases of aging and death, which have been so important for the genesis of culture. This image of the lifespan may in turn help anthropologists come to terms with the physical bases of intergenerational transfers on which the perpetuation of culture depends.     

The functions of societies and the evolution of group living: spider societies as a test case

Many models have been advanced to suggest how different expressions of sociality have evolved and are maintained. However these models ignore the function of groups for the particular species in question. Here we present a new perspective on sociality where the function of the group takes a central role. We argue that sociality may have primarily a reproductive, protective, or foraging function, depending on whether it enhances the reproductive, protective or foraging aspect of the animal's life (sociality may serve a mixture of these functions). Different functions can potentially cause the development of the same social behaviour. By identifying which function influences a particular social behaviour we can determine how that social behaviour will change with changing conditions, and which models are most pertinent. To test our approach we examined spider sociality, which has often been seen as the poor cousin to insect sociality. By using our approach we found that the group characteristics of eusocial insects is largely governed by the reproductive function of their groups, while the group characteristics of social spiders is largely governed by the foraging function of the group. This means that models relevant to insects may not be relevant to spiders. It also explains why eusocial insects have developed a strict caste system while spider societies are more egalitarian. We also used our approach to explain the differences between different types of spider groups. For example, differences in the characteristics of colonial and kleptoparasitic groups can be explained by differences in foraging methods, while differences between colonial and cooperative spiders can be explained by the role of the reproductive function in the formation of cooperative spider groups. Although the interactions within cooperative spider colonies are largely those of a foraging society, demographic traits and colony dynamics are strongly influenced by the reproductive function. We argue that functional explanations help to understand the social structure of spider groups and therefore the evolutionary potential for speciation in social spiders.     

The role of social learning in conservation and fisheries reintroductions

The plight of the world fish stocks is all too well documented. As part of an ongoing attempt to bolster fish stocks for both commercial and conservation purposes, many fish are reared in captivity and released into the wild. It is well known that hatchery‐reared fish have low post‐release survival compared with wild fish of similar age. Part of the reason for this high mortality is that hatchery fish show deficits in virtually all aspects of their behaviour, including prey selection and predator avoidance. Much behaviour requires repeated experience so that it may become fine‐tuned to prevailing circumstances via learning during development. It has been suggested that inappropriate behaviour is encouraged when fish are reared in the unnatural surroundings of the hatchery. However, hatchery fish can be taught to recognise live, novel prey items and predators and the rate of learning is increased in the presence of a more knowledgeable conspecifics. Here we present data showing how social learning protocols can be used to dramatically increase foraging success in juvenile Atlantic salmon. We also outline related aspects of our ongoing research and discuss some of the possibilities for altering hatchery practices to maximize post‐release survival.     

How Elephants are Opening Doors: Developmental Neuroethology, Attachment and Social Context

Ethology's renewed interest in developmental context coincides with recent insights from neurobiology and psychology on early attachment. Attachment and social learning are understood as fundamental mechanisms in development that shape core processes responsible for informing behaviour throughout a lifetime. Each field uniquely contributes to the creation of an integrated model and encourages dialogue between Tinbergen's four analytical levels: ethology in its underscoring of social systems of behaviour and context, psychology in its emphasis on socio‐affective attachment transactions, and neuroscience in its explication of the coupled development of brain and behaviour. We review the relationship between developmental context and behaviour outcome as a topic shared by the three disciplines, with a specific focus on underlying neuroethological mechanisms. This interdisciplinary convergence is illustrated through the example of abnormal behaviour in wild African elephants (Loxodonta africana) that has been systematically observed in human‐caused altered social contexts. Such disruptions impair normative socially mediated neuroendocrinological development leading to psychobiological dysregulation that expresses as non‐normative behaviour. Aberrant behaviour in wild elephants provides a critical field example of what has been established in ex situ and clinical studies but has been largely absent in wild populations: a concrete link between effects of human disturbance on social context, and short‐ and long‐term neuroethology. By so doing, it brings attention to the significant change in theories of behaviour that has been occurring across disciplines – namely, the merging of psychobiological and ethological perspectives into common, cross‐species, human inclusive models.