Contagious by Nature: Understanding Optimisation of Social Networks in Wild Populations

在任何社会中，将个人联系在一起的各种形式的社会互动的无形网络可以被概念化为他们的“社交网络”。这一网络为社会传染因素的传播提供了途径，既有基本的好处（如传播信息），也有巨大的代价（如传染病）。因此，存在着“社会权衡”，即社会联系提供了对个人生活和社会运作至关重要的基本要素（如新的创新、合作行动），但也为有害传染病提供了传播途径（例如病毒）。许多问题围绕着传染病的这些权衡：个人在网络中的位置如何，才能在避免风险的同时获得对他们最重要的利益？哪种类型的社会纽带和关系塑造了不同的传染？一个社会应该如何构建，以促进积极的传染，同时控制有害的传播？值得注意的是，最近的COVID-19大流行清楚地证明了这一点，各国在控制传染的同时努力维持社会运转。然而，这里的考虑因素实际上是一般的任何社会系统暴露于传染病，这项拟议的研究旨在提供新的基于实验的见解到上述每一个问题，因为理解目前仍然非常有限。在这里，我建议野生动物系统预计将精通应对相关的社会权衡，由于这些社会中的社会联系同时充当传染病的途径，同时也依赖于有益的社会传播过程，因此，我将利用自然动物种群未被认识到的潜力来解决这些基本的知识差距，通过（i）综合数百项研究，详细量化野生动物社交网络，（ii）在这些现实世界的系统中进行独特的实验（社会操纵）。通过这种方式，我将利用自然人群提供的独特机会，为如何利用社交网络优化现实世界环境中广泛的传染过程提供急需的经验性见解。通过继续与各领域的应用实践者进行跨学科合作，该奖学金还将探索三个具有更广泛影响力的领域，特别侧重于（i）确定人类社交网络中哪些社会干预措施能够最好地控制疾病（特别是COVID 19），同时造成最小的破坏，㈡如何在与养护有关的系统内以最佳方式推广新举措，以促进可持续行为;社会行为如何有助于心理健康，特别是当社会系统遭受破坏时。最后，通过建立对社会行为和传染的基本理解，该奖学金还将发展未来的调查路线，并建立一个概念框架，以研究（a）多种类型的传染如何相互反馈（例如，疾病传播是否通过改变个人行为而改变行为传染的机会？）以及（B）传染过程如何在较长的时间框架内运作（例如，传染如何影响个人的生存或繁殖？行为的传播是否影响了几代人的文化演变？因此，这项研究将提供新的科学认识，了解如何对现实世界的社交网络进行优化，以适应各种传染，特别是在个人如何定位自己，不同社会联系类型的数量和程度以及人口社交网络的整体架构方面。这将产生新的基础科学认识，用于在一系列领域产生广泛的应用影响，并开辟新的进步领域。

In any society, the invisible web of diverse forms of social interactions that link individuals together can be conceptualised as their 'social network'. This network provides the pathways for socially-contagious elements to spread, which hold essential benefits (e.g. disseminating information) as well as great costs (e.g. infectious diseases). As such, 'social trade-offs' exist, whereby social connections deliver fundamentals that are essential to individuals lives and to societal functioning (e.g. new innovations, cooperative actions) but also provide transmission routes for harmful contagions (e.g. viruses).Many questions surround these trade-offs in contagions: Where can individuals position themselves within the network to reap the benefits most important to them while avoiding the risks? Which type of social bonds and relationships shape the different contagions at play? How should a society be structured to promote positive contagions while simultaneously controlling harmful transmission? Notably, the recent COVID19 pandemic clearly exampled this, with countries struggling to maintain societal functioning while controlling the contagion. Yet, the considerations here are actually general to any social system exposed to contagions, and this proposed research aims to provide new empirically-based insights into each of the aforementioned questions, as understanding currently remains critically limited.Here, I propose that wild animal systems are expected to be well-versed in coping with relevant social trade-offs, as social connections in these societies simultaneously act as pathways for infectious disease while also being relied upon for beneficial social transmission processes Therefore, I will capitalize on the unrecognized potential of natural animal populations for addressing these fundamental knowledge gaps, through (i) synthesising hundreds of studies quantifying wild animal social networks in great detail, and (ii) carrying out unique experiments (social manipulations) within these real-world systems. In this way, I will use the unique opportunities that natural populations offer to provide much-needed empirical insights into how social networks can be harnessed for optimising a broad range of contagion processes in real-world settings.Through continuing my interdisciplinary collaborations with applied practitioners across fields, this fellowship will also explore three areas of wider impact, specifically focusing on (i) identifying which social interventions within human social networks can best control diseases (particularly COVID19) while causing minimal disruption, (ii) how new initiatives can be optimally spread within conservation-relevant systems to promote sustainable behaviours and (iii) how social behaviour can contribute to mental health particularly when social systems suffer disruption.Finally, through building foundational comprehension of social behaviour and contagions, this fellowship will also develop of future lines of investigation, and construct a conceptual frameworks for examining (a) how multiple types of contagions feedback onto one another (e.g. does disease spread alter the opportunities for behavioural contagions through changing individuals' behaviours?) and (b) how contagion processes operate on longer-timeframes (e.g. how do contagions shape individuals' survival or reproduction? does the spread of behaviours shape the evolution of culture over generations?). As such, this research will provide new scientific understanding into how real-world social networks can be optimized for varied contagions, particularly in regards to how individuals position themselves, the quantity and extent of different social bonding types, and the overall architecture of the population's social network. This will produce new fundamental scientific understanding, be used for generating broad applied impact across a range of fields, and open up new areas of advancement.