Social Behaviour Flashcards
What is a social hierarchy?
Social hierarchy is a rank order within a
group of animals consisting of a dominant
and subordinate members.
What behaviours to dominant individuals carry out in a social hierarchy?
Ritualistic (threat)
What behaviours to subordinate individuals carry out in a social hierarchy?
Appeasement
What are the advantages of social hierarchies?
Reduces aggression, saving energy.
Experienced leadership is guaranteed.
Increases the chances of
the dominant animal’s favourable genes
being passed on to offspring.
Animals often form alliances within social hierarchies to increase their social status within the group.
What is co-operative hunting?
Hunting together to take down prey.
How does co-operative hunting increase survival value?
Allows them to kill larger prey.
Each individual uses less energy.
Weaker (subordinate) individuals get a larger share of food than hunting alone.
Increases the chances of hunting success.
What is social defense?
Groups adopt specialised formations when under attack protecting their young.
What are the benefits of social defense?
Increases the chance of survival as some individuals can watch for predators whilst others can forage for food.
What is altruism?
Unselfish behaviour which harms the donor individual but benefits the recipient.
Contradicts survival of the fittest.
Common within families.
What is reciprocal altruism?
Where the roles of donor and recipient later reverse, often occurs in social animals.
What is kin selection?
When a parent/sibling/child sacrifices itself for the survival of the closely related recipient.
What are the advantages of kin selection?
Donor benefits indirectly as it increases chances of survival of shared genes in the recipient’s offspring or future offspring.
What are social insecsts?
Social insects and the structure of their society means that only some individuals (queens and drones) contribute reproductively.
Most member of the colony are sterile workers.
What do sterile workers do?
Co-operate with close relatives to raise relatives to increase survival of shared genes.
Defend the hive.
Collect pollen.
Carry out waggle dances to show the direction of food.
What are some examples of social insects?
Bees
Wasps
Ants
Termites
What are primates?
Primates have a very long period of parental care to allows them to learn complex social behaviours.
Alliances can form between individuals, which are often used to increase social status within the group.
What do complex social behaviours do?
Reduce conflict between members of a group.
Ritualistic display (threat display)
Appeasement behaviour (submissive display)
What are examples of complex social behaviours?
Grooming
Facial expressions
Body posture
Sexual presentation
