Communal singing in the cooperatively breeding subdesert mesite Monias benschi: evidence of numerical assessment?
Communal singing in the cooperatively breeding subdesert mesite Monias benschi: evidence of numerical assessment?
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合作繁殖沙漠亚区中部莫尼亚斯·本斯基（Monias benschi）的集体歌唱：数值评估的证据？
DOI：
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发表时间：
2003
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
J. Tobias
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
N. Seddon;J. Tobias
长期以来，人们一直认为，社会性动物的竞争群体会根据公共发声来相互评估，但到目前为止，这一点仅在哺乳动物中得到证实。我们在沙漠以下的中鸟中研究了这个想法，这是一种群居鸟类，在与其他群体进行侵略性领地互动时会发出公共歌曲。在以团体为单位进行竞争的情况下，团体规模的差异在决定比赛结果时可能会超过个体之间的差异。考虑到该物种的社会系统多变，我们预测群体的构成也会影响其资源持有潜力。回放实验表明，模拟入侵者的数量显着影响了防御群体听到刺激时的反应强度：随着发声入侵者数量的增加，群体不太可能接近，但会做出更持久、更集体的声音反应。我们发现，随着防御组中雄性数量与入侵组中雄性数量之比的增加，一个组接近回放的可能性也随之增加。此外，防御组中成年男性与女性的比例显着影响接近的概率，随着群体变得更加偏向男性，概率会增加。这一发现支持了这样的观点：群体的社会结构对于决定群体之间的竞争结果可能很重要。总体而言，这项研究为鸟类基于声音线索的相对数值评估提供了一些指示。
It has long been suggested that competing groups of social animals assess one another on the basis of communal vocalisations, but so far this has only been demonstrated in mammals. We investigated this idea in the subdesert mesite, a group-living bird that produces communal songs during aggressive territorial interactions with other groups. Where groups compete as units, differences in group size might outweigh inter-individual differences in determining the outcome of contests. Given this species’ variable social system, we predicted that the composition of groups would also influence their resource holding potential. Playback experiments showed that the number of simulated intruders significantly influenced the strength of response by defending groups hearing the stimulus: groups were less likely to approach but gave more protracted and more communal vocal responses as the number of vocalising intruders increased. We found that the likelihood of a group approaching playback increased as the ratio between the number of males in the defending group and the number of males in the intruding group increased. Furthermore, the ratio of adult males to females in the defending group significantly affected the probability of approach, with the probability increasing as groups became more male-biased. This finding supports the idea that the social structure of groups may be important in determining the outcome of contests between groups. Overall this study provides some indication in birds of relative numerical assessment based on vocal cues.