AD animal senses, warning signals Flashcards

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1
Q

What can animals communicate?

A
Aggression
Sex
Identity (individual/group/species/etc.)
Status
Need
Social information
“Auto-communication”
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2
Q

Most signals probably evolved by ritualisation of existing cues
What are some Cues revealing autonomic stimulation?

A

Respiration –e.g. calls, growls, gill-cover flapping

Urination/defecation –e.g. chemical marking of territories

Thermoregulation –e.g. raising hair/feathers

Pupil dilation –cue to “friendliness” / arousal

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3
Q

What are some Ritualisation of cues revealing changes in behaviour?

A

Intention movements –e.g. flight or fight intention movements

Self-protective movements –e.g. scalp retraction in primates

“Displacement” behaviour = interrupting one behaviour with another apparently irrelevant one –e.g. displacement preening in wildfowl mating displays

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4
Q

What are 4 ways in which ritualised signals differ from cues?

A
  1. Conspicuousness - Increases detectability
  2. Redundancy
    e. g. repetition, multi-modal signals, multi-element signals
  3. Stereotypy = very little variation
  4. Alerting components
    e. g. conspicuous movements/sounds
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5
Q

How does ritualisation aid communication?

A

Increasing costs. costs can ensure honesty

Increasing efficacy (effective transfer of information)

Increase ability of signallers to manipulate receivers …& prevent receivers resisting their message

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6
Q

Signals evolve to maximise transmission & minimise eavesdropping eg conspicuousness to predators
Give an example

A

Guppies exposed to different predators have different colour patterns

Predators drive selection for use of “private wavelengths”

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7
Q

Vervet monkeys have an example of coding. How?

A

Leaned calls for specific circumstances:

‘Leopard’ - head for the trees

‘Snake’ - stand & search

‘Raptor’ - look at the sky

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8
Q

What is aposematism?

A

Aposematism is the advertising by an animal to potential predators that it is not worth attacking or eating

Benefit = predator deterrence
Cost = conspicuousness
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9
Q

How do warning signals work?

A

Unprofitable prey = toxic / distasteful / hard to catch

Conspicuous signal

  • Depends on predator senses
  • Signals can be “multimodal”
  1. Predators “learn” the link between signal & profitability
    - Memory-based learning by individual predators
    - Selection against predators that eat unprofitable prey
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