Intraspecific Variation in Learning: Worker Wasps Are Less Able to Learn and Remember Individual Conspecific Faces than Queen Wasps

Tibbetts, Elizabeth A.; Injaian, Allison; Sheehan, Michael J.; DesJardins, Nicole

doi:10.1086/696848

Cited by 20 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 43 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…This dominance behavior itself, cognitive demands associated with dominance (e.g. Tibbetts et al , ), or physiological changes associated with dominance, including increased JH titers and brain amine expression (Hamilton et al , ) may also affect MB volume. Paper wasps show a correlation between dominance status and MB size (O'Donnell et al , ; Molina and O'Donnell, ; ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Queen Dominance May Reduce Worker Mushroom Body Size in a Social Bee

Jaumann

Seid

Simons

et al. 2019

Developmental Neurobiology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The mushroom body (MB) is an area of the insect brain involved in learning, memory, and sensory integration. Here, we used the sweat bee Megalopta genalis (Halictidae) to test for differences between queens and workers in the volume of the MB calyces. We used confocal microscopy to measure the volume of the whole brain, MB calyces, optic lobes, and antennal lobes of queens and workers. Queens had larger brains, larger MB calyces, and a larger MB calyces:whole brain ratio than workers, suggesting an effect of social dominance in brain development. This could result from social interactions leading to smaller worker MBs, or larger queen MBs. It could also result from other factors, such as differences in age or sensory experience. To test these explanations, we next compared queens and workers to other groups. We compared newly emerged bees, bees reared in isolation for 10 days, bees initiating new observation nests, and bees initiating new natural nests collected from the field to queens and workers. Queens did not differ from these other groups. We suggest that the effects of queen dominance over workers, rather than differences in age, experience, or reproductive status, are responsible for the queen-worker differences we observed. Worker MB development may be affected by queen aggression directly and/or manipulation of larval nutrition, which is provisioned by the queen. We found no consistent differences in the size of antennal lobes or optic lobes associated with differences in age, experience, reproductive status, or social caste.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Queen Dominance May Reduce Worker Mushroom Body Size in a Social Bee

Jaumann

Seid

Simons

et al. 2019

Developmental Neurobiology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Although P. metricus do interact as workers, previous work indicates that individual recognition does not seem to play an important role in worker‐worker interactions on queenright nests (Tibbetts et al. ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 96%

Developmental plasticity and the origin of novel communication systems: Individual recognition in Polistes wasps*

2018

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Although developmental plasticity facilitates the evolutionary origin of many traits, the role of plasticity in the origin of novel communication systems has received little attention. If plasticity mediates the origin of new communication systems, exposure to a novel environment will induce new traits that could function as signals or receiver responses. Here, we test whether plasticity facilitates the origin of individual recognition. We reared a species of paper wasp that naturally lacks individual recognition (Polistes metricus) with a relative that has facial patterns that signal individual identity (Polistes fuscatus). We found P. metricus reared with individual identity signals learned unique wasp faces significantly more accurately than P. metricus reared without individual identity signals. However, exposure to individual identity signals was not sufficient to induce individual recognition in social contexts. These results suggest that if variable facial patterns arose in P. metricus, wasps would immediately improve their ability learn variable facial patterns, thereby facilitating the origin of individual face recognition. Improved learning is an initial step toward individual recognition that would need to be refined by selection to produce an established signaling system. Developmental plasticity may be an underappreciated factor facilitating the evolutionary origin of novel recognition systems.

show abstract

“…This dominance behavior itself, cognitive demands associated with dominance (e.g. Tibbetts et al 2018), or physiological changes associated with dominance, including increased JH titers and brain amine expression (Hamilton et al 2017) may also affect MB volume. Paper wasps show a correlation between dominance status and MB size (O'Donnell et al 2007, Molina and O'Donnell 2007.…”

Section: Author Manuscriptmentioning

confidence: 99%