@article{SchneebergerTaborsky2020, author = {Schneeberger, Karin and Taborsky, Michael}, title = {The role of sensory ecology and cognition in social decisions}, series = {Functional ecology : an official journal of the British Ecological Society}, volume = {34}, journal = {Functional ecology : an official journal of the British Ecological Society}, number = {2}, publisher = {Wiley}, address = {Hoboken}, issn = {0269-8463}, doi = {10.1111/1365-2435.13488}, pages = {302 -- 309}, year = {2020}, abstract = {1. We generally assume that animals should maximize information acquisition about their environment to make prudent decisions. But this is a naive assumption, as gaining information typically involves costs.
2. This is especially so in the social context, where interests between interacting partners usually diverge. The arms race involved in mutual assessment is characterized by the attempt to obtain revealing information from a partner while providing only as much information by oneself as is conducive to one's own intentions.
3. If obtaining information occasions costs in terms of time, energy and risk, animals should be selected to base their decisions on a cost-benefit ratio that takes account of the trade-off between the risk of making wrong choices and the costs involved in information acquisition, processing and use.
4. In addition, there may be physiological and/or environmental constraints limiting the ability to obtaining, processing and utilizing reliable information.
5. Here, we discuss recent empirical evidence for the proposition that social decisions are to an important extent based on the costs that result from acquiring, processing, evaluating and storing information. Using examples from different taxa and ecological contexts, we aim at drawing attention to the often neglected costs of information recipience, with emphasis on the potential role of sensory ecology and cognition in social decisions.}, language = {en} } @article{SchneebergerSchulzeScheffleretal.2021, author = {Schneeberger, Karin and Schulze, Michael and Scheffler, Ingo and Caspers, Barbara A.}, title = {Evidence of female preference for odor of distant over local males in a bat with female dispersal}, series = {Behavioral ecology : the official journal of the International Society for Behavioral Ecology}, volume = {32}, journal = {Behavioral ecology : the official journal of the International Society for Behavioral Ecology}, number = {4}, publisher = {Oxford University Press}, address = {Oxford}, issn = {1045-2249}, doi = {10.1093/beheco/arab003}, pages = {657 -- 661}, year = {2021}, abstract = {Geographic variation of sexually selected male traits is common in animals. Female choice also varies geographically and several studies found female preference for local males, which is assumed to lead to local adaptation and, therefore, increases fitness. As females are the nondispersing sex in most mammalian taxa, this preference for local males might be explained by the learning of male characteristics. Studies on the preference of females in female-dispersing species are lacking so far. To find out whether such females would also show preferences for local males, we conducted a study on greater sac-winged bats (Saccopteryx bilineata), a species where females disperse and males stay in their natal colony. Male greater sac-winged bats possess a wing pouch that is filled with odoriferous secretion and fanned toward females during courtship display. In a combination of chemical analysis and behavioral preference tests, we analyzed whether the composition of wing sac secretion varies between two geographically distinct populations (300 km), and whether females show a preference for local or distant male scent. Using gas chromatography, we found significant differences in the composition of the wing sac odors between the two geographically distinct populations. In addition, the behavioral preference experiments revealed that females of both populations preferred the scent of geographically distant males over local males. The wing sac odor might thus be used to guarantee optimal outbreeding when dispersing to a new colony. This is-to our knowledge-the first study on odor preference of females of a species with female-biased dispersal.}, language = {en} } @article{SchneebergerRoederTaborsky2020, author = {Schneeberger, Karin and R{\"o}der, Gregory and Taborsky, Michael}, title = {The smell of hunger}, series = {PLoS biology}, volume = {18}, journal = {PLoS biology}, number = {3}, publisher = {PLoS}, address = {San Fransisco}, issn = {1544-9173}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pbio.3000628}, pages = {13}, year = {2020}, abstract = {When individuals exchange helpful acts reciprocally, increasing the benefit of the receiver can enhance its propensity to return a favour, as pay-offs are typically correlated in iterated interactions. Therefore, reciprocally cooperating animals should consider the relative benefit for the receiver when deciding to help a conspecific. Norway rats (Rattus norvegicus) exchange food reciprocally and thereby take into account both the cost of helping and the potential benefit to the receiver. By using a variant of the sequential iterated prisoner's dilemma paradigm, we show that rats may determine the need of another individual by olfactory cues alone. In an experimental food-exchange task, test subjects were provided with odour cues from hungry or satiated conspecifics located in a different room. Our results show that wild-type Norway rats provide help to a stooge quicker when they receive odour cues from a hungry rather than from a satiated conspecific. Using chemical analysis by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS), we identify seven volatile organic compounds that differ in their abundance between hungry and satiated rats. Combined, this "smell of hunger" can apparently serve as a reliable cue of need in reciprocal cooperation, which supports the hypothesis of honest signalling.}, language = {en} } @article{SchneebergerEccard2021, author = {Schneeberger, Karin and Eccard, Jana}, title = {Experience of social density during early life is associated with attraction to conspecific odour in the common vole (Microtus arvalis)}, series = {Ethology : international journal of behavioural biology}, volume = {127}, journal = {Ethology : international journal of behavioural biology}, number = {10}, publisher = {Wiley-Blackwell}, address = {Berlin}, issn = {0179-1613}, doi = {10.1111/eth.13211}, pages = {908 -- 913}, year = {2021}, abstract = {Social organisation in species with fluctuating population sizes can change with density. Therefore, information on (future) density obtained during early life stages may be associated with social behaviour. Olfactory cues may carry important social information. We investigated whether early life experience of different experimental densities was subsequently associated with differences in attraction to adult conspecific odours. We used common voles (Microtus arvalis), a rodent species undergoing extreme density fluctuations. We found that individuals originating from high experimental density populations kept in large outdoor enclosures invested more time in inspecting conspecific olfactory cues than individuals from low-density populations. Generally, voles from both treatments spent more time with the olfactory cues than expected by chance and did not differ in their latency to approach the odour samples. Our findings indicate either that early experience affects odour sensitivity or that animals evaluate the social information contained in conspecific odours differently, depending on their early life experience of conspecific density.}, language = {en} }