Consistent sociality but flexible social associations across temporal and spatial foraging contexts in a colonial breeder

Abstract

When the consequences of sociality differ depending on the state of individual animals and the experienced environment, individuals may benefit from altering their social behaviours in a context‐dependent manner. Thus, to fully address the hypotheses about the role of social associations it is imperative to consider the multidimensional nature of sociality by explicitly examining social associations across multiple scales and contexts. We simultaneously recorded > 8000 associations from 85% of breeding individuals from a colony of Australasian gannets (Morus serrator) over a 2‐week period, and examined gregariousness across four foraging states using multilayer social network analysis. We found that social associations varied in a context‐dependent manner, highlighting that social associations are most prevalent during foraging (local enhancement) and in regions expected to provide clustered resources. We also provide evidence of individual consistency in gregariousness, but flexibility in social associates, demonstrating that individuals can adjust their social behaviours to match experienced conditions.

Multiyear social stability and social information use in reef sharks with diel fission–fusion dynamics

“…Competition will counteract the advantages of larger group sizes, although this effect may be reduced if patch quality is highly variable and if travel times to patches are short (Sernland andOlsson 2003, Smolla et al 2015). Empirical support for these predictions can be found in bats and seabirds where social foraging is generally only seen in species or individuals foraging on ephemeral prey (Egert-Berg et al 2018, Jones et al 2020.…”

“…Fission-fusion dynamics can contribute to or smaller groups (e.g. Wakefield et al 2013, Hooker et al 2015, Jones et al 2020. In most cases, the central place is the location of a nest, shelter, or haul-out site which explains loyalty and fidelity to the central place.…”

The role of kinship and demography in shaping cooperation amongst male lions

“…Since unit effect of direct and indirect benefits are not equivalent, an individual’s decision to cooperate is based on the cost-benefit trade-offs that originate from such discrepancies over the long-term 2 , 3 . These trade-offs are primarily resource and socially mediated, and consequently such decisions are context driven and often exhibit plasticity across temporal and spatial scales 4 , 5 , resulting in diverse instances and pathways of cooperation. For example, in common vampire bats Desmodus rotundus food-sharing is better explained by previous mutualistic encounters than relatedness between the donors and recipients 6 .…”

Dynamic shifts in social network structure and composition within a breeding hybrid population

“…Fisher, Rodríguez‐Muñoz, & Tregenza, 2016; Shizuka et al., 2014), as well as ones with extensive rewiring in interactions of the same individuals over time (e.g. Jones et al., 2020). These studies suggest that the relative contribution of β OS and β ST on overall network dissimilarity ( β WN ) is likely to range across almost the entire {0,1} interval, but we are aware of no previous studies of social networks that employed this breakdown, so cannot compare our own results to other relevant estimates.…”

“…Nonetheless, observations of other dynamic social networks have shown situations with relatively stable individual interactions but high turnover (e.g Fisher, Rodríguez-Muñoz, & Tregenza, 2016;Shizuka et al, 2014),. as well as ones with extensive rewiring in interactions of the same individuals over time (e.g Jones et al, 2020)…”