Social Interrelations Involved in Migratory Orientation of Birds: Possible Contribution of Field Studies

Wallraff, Hans Georg

doi:10.2307/3543490

Cited by 66 publications

(42 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…Our work suggests that "madness" and "wisdom" are inescapably entwined. Enhanced group cognition is a clear benefit of living together (12)(13)(14)(15)(16), but in situations in which decision making should be straightforward there is a cost to relying on the judgment of others.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ant colonies outperform individuals when a sensory discrimination task is difficult but not when it is easy

Sasaki

Granovskiy

Mann

et al. 2013

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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“Collective intelligence” and “wisdom of crowds” refer to situations in which groups achieve more accurate perception and better decisions than solitary agents. Whether groups outperform individuals should depend on the kind of task and its difficulty, but the nature of this relationship remains unknown. Here we show that colonies of Temnothorax ants outperform individuals for a difficult perception task but that individuals do better than groups when the task is easy. Subjects were required to choose the better of two nest sites as the quality difference was varied. For small differences, colonies were more likely than isolated ants to choose the better site, but this relationship was reversed for large differences. We explain these results using a mathematical model, which shows that positive feedback between group members effectively integrates information and sharpens the discrimination of fine differences. When the task is easier the same positive feedback can lock the colony into a suboptimal choice. These results suggest the conditions under which crowds do or do not become wise.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Similarly, groups of fish can better distinguish between stimuli than individuals (1), and pairs of homing pigeons take more efficient routes than solitary birds (11). Condorcet's Jury Theorem and the Central Limit Theorem show that the accuracy of a group of independent decision makers improves with group size (12)(13)(14)(15)(16).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Ant colonies outperform individuals when a sensory discrimination task is difficult but not when it is easy

Sasaki

Granovskiy

Mann

et al. 2013

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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“…According to the "Many-wrongs principle" (Bergman & Donner 1964;Hamilton 1967;Wallraff 1978;Simons 2004) group cohesion allows a more accurate navigation because individual errors are mutually corrected through information pooling. Such advantage of group navigation found further support by theoretical models showing that even experienced and informed individuals have a larger navigational error than the combined error of several inexperienced group members (Conradt & Roper 2003).…”

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confidence: 99%

Flock flying improves pigeons' homing: GPS track analysis of individual flyers versus small groups

et al. 2008

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The effects of aggregation in navigating animals have generated growing interest in field and theoretical studies. The few studies on the effects of group flying on the performance of homing pigeons (Columba livia) have led to controversial conclusions, chiefly because of the lack of appropriate technology to follow pigeons during their entire homeward flight. Therefore, we used GPS data-loggers in six highly pre-trained pigeons from a familiar release site first by releasing them six times individually, then six times as a group from the same site, and finally, again six times individually. Flight data showed that the homing performance of the birds flying as a flock was significantly better than that of the birds released individually. When flying in a flock, pigeons showed no resting episodes, shorter homing times, higher speed, and almost no circling around the start zone in comparison to individual flights. Moreover, flock-flying pigeons took a nearly direct, "beeline" route to the loft, whereas individually flying birds preferred to follow roads and other longitudinal landmarks leading towards the loft, even when it caused a detour. Our results show that group cohesion facilitates a shift towards more efficient homing strategies: individuals prefer navigating by familiar landmarks, while flocks show a compass orientation.

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“…For example, in the European Council of Ministers, larger countries have greater voting weight than smaller countries. In animal groups, hungrier group members can gain more influence on group movement directions than well-fed members (Krause et al 1992; (King et al 2008) travelling start in dolphins (Lusseau & Conradt in press) at least partially shared cohesive group movements in small groups of birds (Black 1988;Biro et al 2006), carnivores (Gompper 1996), ungulates (Conradt & Roper 2003) and primates (Stewart & Harcourt 1994;Boinski & Campbell 1995;Byrne 2000;Milton 2000) cohesive group movements in large swarms of insects (Buhl et al 2006), shoals of fishes ( Ward et al 2008), flocks of birds ( Wallraff 1978;Simons 2004) or herds of ungulates (Prins 1996) group activity synchronization (Conradt 1998;Ruckstuhl 1998Ruckstuhl , 1999 nest-site choice in eusocial insects (Seeley & Buhrman 1999;Franks et al 2009) and bats (Kerth et al 2006) coordination of cooperative hunts (Courchamp et al 2002) What matters in this game is that they both choose the same strategy (a biological example would be reproductive synchronization). If they fail to coordinate, they both receive nothing.…”

Section: Basic Definitionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Dispersing swarms of bees and ants collectively choose new nest sites on which their survival depends (Seeley & Buhrman 1999;Visscher 2007;Visscher & Seeley 2007;Franks et al 2009). Homing and migrating birds collectively decide on communal routes that determine their chances of survival and successful arrival (Wallraff 1978;Simons 2004;Biro et al 2006). Bats collectively select roosting sites that are crucial for survival (Kerth et al 2006).…”

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confidence: 99%

Group decisions in humans and animals: a survey

Conradt

List

2008

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

274

198

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Humans routinely make many decisions collectively, whether they choose a restaurant with friends, elect political leaders or decide actions to tackle international problems, such as climate change, that affect the future of the whole planet. We might be less aware of it, but group decisions are just as important to social animals as they are for us. Animal groups have to collectively decide about communal movements, activities, nesting sites and enterprises, such as cooperative breeding or hunting, that crucially affect their survival and reproduction. While human group decisions have been studied for millennia, the study of animal group decisions is relatively young, but is now expanding rapidly. It emerges that group decisions in animals pose many similar questions to those in humans. The purpose of the present issue is to integrate and combine approaches in the social and natural sciences in an area in which theoretical challenges and research questions are often similar, and to introduce each discipline to the other's key ideas, findings and successful methods. In order to make such an introduction as effective as possible, here, we briefly review conceptual similarities and differences between the sciences, and provide a guide to the present issue.Keywords: collective decisions; communal decisions; conflict resolution; cooperation; information sharing; social behaviour GENERAL BACKGROUNDHumans usually live in highly sophisticated societies. This implies that many important decisions are made not by individuals acting alone, but by groups of individuals acting collectively. Group decisions in humans range from small-scale decisions, such as those taken by groups of relatives, friends or colleagues, to large-scale decisions, such as nation-wide democratic elections and international agreements. Clearly, human societies cannot function without group decisions, and some of the most pressing problems facing humanity result from failures to reach a group consensus (e.g. the signing of the Kyoto treaty on controlling greenhouse gas emissions). Group decision making has been a central topic in all of the social sciences for millennia (e.g. Plato: The Republic 360 BC). Nevertheless, many questions remain open, particularly how conflicting interests and the sharing of dispersed information are actually, and should be, in principle, reconciled so as to facilitate cooperation and to reach outcomes that meet various optimality criteria. These are some of the fundamental questions of social choice theory (e.g. Arrow 1951Arrow /1963Austen-Smith & Banks 1999Sen 1999;Dryzek & List 2003). A large number of animal species also live in groups (Krause & Ruxton 2002), some of which can be very complex (e.g. eusocial bees, wasps, ants, termites and mole rats). Group decision making is just as important for social animals as it is for us (see Conradt & Roper 2005 for a review). Dispersing swarms of bees and ants collectively choose new nest sites on which their survival depends (Seeley & Buhrman 1999;Visscher 2007;Visscher & Seele...

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Social Interrelations Involved in Migratory Orientation of Birds: Possible Contribution of Field Studies

Cited by 66 publications

References 12 publications

Ant colonies outperform individuals when a sensory discrimination task is difficult but not when it is easy

Ant colonies outperform individuals when a sensory discrimination task is difficult but not when it is easy

Flock flying improves pigeons' homing: GPS track analysis of individual flyers versus small groups

Group decisions in humans and animals: a survey

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