Historical Effects on the Evolution of Female Preferences

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Animal Behavior ProgramNontechnical AbstractProposal #: 9816564PI: Michael J. RyanTitle: Historical effects on the evolution of female preferencesAnimal communication involves a signaler and receiver. The mechanisms and evolution of communication systems will be investigated by examination of how receivers (female tungara frogs) respond to different levels of variation in signals (male calls). Natural signal variation, the differences between male calls, occurs within local populations, among populations, and among species. Females will be presented calls from different populations of frogs to determine if they prefer local calls to foreign calls, even though all calls are of the same species. These results will reveal whether or not signal variation among populations in calls contains meaningful information. The investigators will also present females with calls from other species and synthetic calls that differ from the species-specific call in specified ways. Responses to this level of variation will be used to examine the evolutionary trajectory of receiver preferences. Human-engineered communication systems, such as a radio receiver and transmitter, have a perfect match between a signal and receiver. But animal communication systems evolve and their past evolutionary history can determine the degree to which a signal and a receiver are matched. By understanding how receivers respond to signal variation within species, among species, as well as to evolutionary relevant synthetic signals, the effects of past evolutionary history on current function of animal communication systems can be understood.