Exam 3 Flashcards
Game Theory
- An evolutionary approach to the study of adaptive value in which payoffs to individuals associated with one behavioral tactic are dependent upon what the other members of the group are doing
Ideal Free Distribution (IFD)
- The distribution of individuals in space that are free to choose where to go in ways that could maximize their fitness
- Individuals should always select the best habitat available
- As more individuals enter habitat quality decreases due to competition for resources
- All individuals have equally reduced quality habitats
- Resources available in each patch are always equal to R/N where..
- > R = # of resources in each patch
- > N = # of individuals in each patch
- > Eventually the value of each patch becomes equal to one another
Why do so few animals forage optimally?
- usually assume predation risk, patch value and starvation risk are all constants which are not true in the wild
- > Methods will switch given the change in energy reserves, or since you have been last fed
- Risk Sensitive Model shows they will not forage optimally as well
- > because the optimal foraging models assume that everyone is at the same risk of starvation and that is not always true
- Predation-Foraging Trade-off shows they will not forage optimally as well
- > there are also other risks of foraging such as predation
- > assumes that patch value is a constant
- > predation risk is a constant
Predation Risk Model: Escaping Attacks
- Startle coloration
- Bright flash patches
eyespots - Evasive maneuvers
- Group behaviors
- Vigilance
- Confusion effect
- Mobbing
Vertical Waggle Dance Problem Rules
- Top = 0
- Bottom = 180
- Sun is always at the top
- Measure clockwise from top
- Top is N, Bottom S Right is E and Left W
- Arrows are vectors and indicate the direction of the waggle dance
- CAN NOT use times it is only the distance between the flower and sun
Anti-predatory Behaviors Methods
- Evolutionary Arms Race
- Predation Risk Model
- Spiny Lobster Adaptations
Situation
- a given set of conditions at one point in time
- Different situations could involve different levels along an environmental gradient (different levels of predation risk) or different sets of conditions across time (the breeding season versus the non-breeding season)
Categories of Communication: Sexual Intraspecific
- Specificity = High
- Elements = Many
- Deception = Low
Economic Defendability
- When should an individual defend a territory vs. share a territory?
- > When the benefits of extra resources is greater than the cost of territory defense
Evolutionary Arms Race
- Predators and prey co-evolve adaptations for prey capture and predator avoidance due to their strong evolutionary influence on one another
- > Predators and prey are trying to outdue one another in terms of an optimal strategy
- > Predators are selected for improving foraging and prey are selected for improving defenses
- Red Queen Hypothesis
In an Evolutionary Arms Race what traits do predators acquire?
- Visual acuity
- Search image
- Search patterns
- Learning ability
- Speed
- Offensive weapons
- Detoxins
What is the one assumption that differs between the ideal free and ideal despotic distributions?
- In the IFD, Competitors are equal in all respects
- Whereas in the IDD, Competitors are unequal in their ability to exploit resources
Habitat Preferences, or how do individuals come to recognize suitable habitats?
- Innate settlement cues
- > Environmental cues for example Conch use red algae
- > Reef fish use sounds of waves breaking on the reef - Learn cues from natal habitat
- Butterflies
- Salmon
- Arctic terns - Use conspecifics as settlement cue
- Barnacles
- Lizards
- Song birds
Ritualization
- The evolutionary process whereby a convenient behavior, anatomic structure, or physiological change becomes molded into a useful signal.
- The original trait is modified by changing either the rate, intensity, orientation, or rhythm of performance until the evolved signal is produced independently from the original trait from which the signal evolved.
Landscape Projection Problem Rules
- Rules
1. South = 180 - always on top
2. North = 0 - always on bottom
3. East = 90 - always on left
4. West = 270 - always on right
5. Sun moves at 15 degrees/hr - in a clockwise projection
6. Sun always rises at 6 am (0600) and sets at 6 pm (1800) - > sun rises in the east at 90 degrees
- > whatever time is given find the difference of hours passed since 6 am
8. SE is halfway between S and E = 135 degrees
Predation Risk Model: Avoiding Detection
- Coloration
- Disruptive coloration
- Cryptic
- Polymorphism - Distribution and spacing
- Cryptic behavior
- Remaining motionless
- Swaying rhythmically
Predictions of The General Theory of Play
- Those individuals with more play experience should do better in loss of control situations
- Dominant individuals should allow subordinates to defeat them during play bouts
- Play behaviors should activate the somatosensory, motor and emotional regions of the brain
- Play should be most common in species that experience the most variable environment
Personality
- A consistent long-term phenotypic behavioral response of an individual across different situations
- > Behavioral type, or behavioral phenotype
- > Coping styles
- > Personality
- Opposite of behavioral plasticity
- > The ability of an organism to behave differently depending on the environmental conditions
In the Prey Selection Model what size prey items should be selected to maximize the net rate of energy intake?
- Assumption is that prey items of different sizes will have different profitabilities
- > energy gained / energy expended
- Prediction is that optimal foragers should select prey that maximize their net energy intake
- Another Prediction is that optimal foragers should be choosy about the size of prey they select
Coping Style
- A set of behavioral and related stress responses that are consistent over time
Diet Selection Model Generalist vs Specialist
- Answers the question of which prey types should be included in an optimal diet to maximize the net rate of energy intake?
- Important in herbivores because they eat a variety of different plants, etc
- Generalist and Specialist
-> Specialist feeds primarily on a single prey item
-> Generalist feeds more broadly on prey items available - This model tries to predict when you bring more than one item into your diet
-> Aka when is it better to be a generalist vs a specialist?
Ex: If the specialist equation is higher than the generalist equation than the animal should be a specialist and eat one prey item instead of being a generalist and including two or more prey items in their diet and vice versa if generalist equation is higher
Spiny Lobster Adaptations for Antipredatory Behavior: How do spiny lobsters reduce predation risk? Is gregariousness an adaptation to reduce predation risk? Which level of the predation process (encounter, detection, capture) does the gregarious behavior of spiny lobsters most likely confer an advantage?
- How do spiny lobsters reduce predation risk?
1. Avoid Encounters - emerge from shelters only at night and hide during the day
2. Avoid Detection - transparent, or clear
3. Discourage Attacks - giant spines
4. Escaping Attacks - group defense
5. Avoiding Consumption - shell, spine and will even become aggressive towards conspecifics
- Is gregariousness an adaptation to reduce predation risk?
- > NO, aggregate ONLY because they use the odors to locate limited shelters and when attacked every man for himself
- Which level of the predation process (encounter, detection, capture) does the gregarious behavior of spiny lobsters most likely confer an advantage?
- > Gregariousness begins
1. When crypsis ends
2. When seeking crevice shelters
3. Before group defense is effective - Gregariousness is:
1. Favored by reducing encounters*
2. Not favored by escaping attacks
3. May be decreasing in lobsters today
Evolution of Communication: Handicaps
- Handicaps are honest signals because they are costly to produce
- Low quality males cannot afford to produce these high cost signals, but high quality males can.
Ex: - If the benefit (B) of producing a costly ornament is equal for all males…
- And the cost (C) of producing the ornament is less in high quality males than in low quality males…
-> The signal is a reliable indicator of male quality because only high quality males are selected to produce the signal
Many eyes hypothesis
- Safety in numbers that comes from an increased probability of detecting a predator’s approach by a group of vigilant prey.