Public information for the assessment of quality: a widespread social phenomenon

Valone, Thomas J.; Templeton, Jennifer J.

doi:10.1098/rstb.2002.1064

Cited by 354 publications

(307 citation statements)

References 71 publications

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“…Social factors integrate the effects of environmental factors on breeding-site selection . Moreover, indirect social cues are assumed as useful when birds have limited time for habitat sampling because of the seasonal constraints of breeding (Boulinier and Danchin 1997;Valone and Templeton 2002). Since swallows are migratory birds, they likely have limited habitat-sampling opportunities.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social cues are preferred over resource cues for breeding-site selection in Barn Swallows

Ringhofer

Hasegawa

2014

J Ornithol

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To maximize fitness, animals choose habitats by using a combination of direct resource cues, such as the quality and quantity of safe breeding sites or food resources, and indirect social cues, such as the presence or breeding performance of conspecifics. Many reports show that nest predation leads to reduced fitness. However, it remains unclear how birds assess predation risk and how it affects breeding-site selection. In this study, we analyzed the relationship between predation risk and breeding-site selection in Barn Swallows (Hirundo rustica). We assessed the cues that swallows use in their selection. We used nestsite characteristics related to predation and foraging sites as direct resource cues, number of breeding pairs, and breeding success in the previous year as indirect social cues, and number of old and undamaged old nests as direct resource and/or indirect social cues. Breeding-site preference was assessed using the arrival date of males. We showed that only the number of undamaged old nests was used for breeding-site selection. When comparing effects at two spatial scales, nest-site and home-range, the effect of the number of undamaged old nests occurred at the homerange scale only, suggesting that these nests are used as an indirect social cue rather than a direct resource cue to reduce the energy or time-consuming costs of nest building. We suggest that undamaged old nests may indicate the presence and breeding performance of conspecifics for several previous years. Because Barn Swallows are migratory birds, undamaged old nests may be a reliable indirect social cue and may reduce the time required to sample information at breeding sites.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social cues are preferred over resource cues for breeding-site selection in Barn Swallows

Ringhofer

Hasegawa

2014

J Ornithol

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“…Social eavesdropping (McGregor, 2005) is the act of obtaining public information from signaling interactions between conspecifics (Valone, 1989;Valone and Templeton, 2002). It is thought to occur when an individual changes his behaviour towards a conspecific, after observing the latter in a social interaction (Bonnie and Earley, 2007).…”

Section: The Role Of Public Information and Social Eavesdropping In Mmentioning

confidence: 99%

Computational mate choice: Theory and empirical evidence

Castellano

Cadeddu

Cermelli

2012

Behavioural Processes

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a b s t r a c tThe present review is based on the thesis that mate choice results from information-processing mechanisms governed by computational rules and that, to understand how females choose their mates, we should identify which are the sources of information and how they are used to make decisions. We describe mate choice as a three-step computational process and for each step we present theories and review empirical evidence. The first step is a perceptual process. It describes the acquisition of evidence, that is, how females use multiple cues and signals to assign an attractiveness value to prospective mates (the preference function hypothesis). The second step is a decisional process. It describes the construction of the decision variable (DV), which integrates evidence (private information by direct assessment), priors (public information), and value (perceived utility) of prospective mates into a quantity that is used by a decision rule (DR) to produce a choice. We make the assumption that females are optimal Bayesian decision makers and we derive a formal model of DV that can explain the effects of preference functions, mate copying, social context, and females' state and condition on the patterns of mate choice. The third step of mating decision is a deliberative process that depends on the DRs. We identify two main categories of DRs (absolute and comparative rules), and review the normative models of mate sampling tactics associated to them. We highlight the limits of the normative approach and present a class of computational models (sequential-sampling models) that are based on the assumption that DVs accumulate noisy evidence over time until a decision threshold is reached. These models force us to rethink the dichotomy between comparative and absolute decision rules, between discrimination and recognition, and even between rational and irrational choice. Since they have a robust biological basis, we think they may represent a useful theoretical tool for behavioural ecologist interested in integrating proximate and ultimate causes of mate choice.

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“…In addition, an individual may learn about the quality of a resource, such as a food patch, by noting its own foraging success rate in the patch. It may also make note of the successful and unsuccessful search attempts of other foragers in the same patch and use such socially acquired public information to speed and improve the accuracy of its estimate (Clark & Mangel 1986;Valone 1989;Valone & Templeton 2002).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Potential disadvantages of using socially acquired information

Giraldeau

Valone

Templeton

2002

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B

Self Cite

499

439

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The acquisition and use of socially acquired information is commonly assumed to be profitable. We challenge this assumption by exploring hypothetical scenarios where the use of such information either provides no benefit or can actually be costly. First, we show that the level of incompatibility between the acquisition of personal and socially acquired information will directly affect the extent to which the use of socially acquired information can be profitable. When these two sources of information cannot be acquired simultaneously, there may be no benefit to socially acquired information. Second, we assume that a solitary individual's behavioural decisions will be based on cues revealed by its own interactions with the environment. However, in many cases, for social animals the only socially acquired information available to individuals is the behavioural actions of others that expose their decisions, rather than the cues on which these decisions were based. We argue that in such a situation the use of socially acquired information can lead to informational cascades that sometimes result in sub-optimal behaviour. From this theory of informational cascades, we predict that when erroneous cascades are costly, individuals should pay attention only to socially generated cues and not behavioural decisions. We suggest three scenarios that might be examples of informational cascades in nature.

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Public information for the assessment of quality: a widespread social phenomenon

Cited by 354 publications

References 71 publications

Social cues are preferred over resource cues for breeding-site selection in Barn Swallows

Social cues are preferred over resource cues for breeding-site selection in Barn Swallows

Computational mate choice: Theory and empirical evidence

Potential disadvantages of using socially acquired information

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