The Experts below are selected from a list of 31020 Experts worldwide ranked by ideXlab platform
Stephanie L. King - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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you talkin to me interactive playback is a powerful yet underused tool in Animal Communication research
Biology Letters, 2015Co-Authors: Stephanie L. KingAbstract:Over the years, playback experiments have helped further our understanding of the wonderful world of Animal Communication. They have provided fundamental insights into Animal behaviour and the function of communicative signals in numerous taxa. As important as these experiments are, however, there is strong evidence to suggest that the information conveyed in a signal may only have value when presented interactively. By their very nature, signalling exchanges are interactive and therefore, an interactive playback design is a powerful tool for examining the function of such exchanges. While researchers working on frog and songbird vocal interactions have long championed interactive playback, it remains surprisingly underused across other taxa. The interactive playback approach is not limited to studies of acoustic signalling, but can be applied to other sensory modalities, including visual, chemical and electrical Communication. Here, I discuss interactive playback as a potent yet underused technique in the field of Animal behaviour. I present a concise review of studies that have used interactive playback thus far, describe how it can be applied, and discuss its limitations and challenges. My hope is that this review will result in more scientists applying this innovative technique to their own study subjects, as a means of furthering our understanding of the function of signalling interactions in Animal Communication systems.
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You talkin’ to me? Interactive playback is a powerful yet underused tool in Animal Communication research
Biology letters, 2015Co-Authors: Stephanie L. KingAbstract:Over the years, playback experiments have helped further our understanding of the wonderful world of Animal Communication. They have provided fundamental insights into Animal behaviour and the function of communicative signals in numerous taxa. As important as these experiments are, however, there is strong evidence to suggest that the information conveyed in a signal may only have value when presented interactively. By their very nature, signalling exchanges are interactive and therefore, an interactive playback design is a powerful tool for examining the function of such exchanges. While researchers working on frog and songbird vocal interactions have long championed interactive playback, it remains surprisingly underused across other taxa. The interactive playback approach is not limited to studies of acoustic signalling, but can be applied to other sensory modalities, including visual, chemical and electrical Communication. Here, I discuss interactive playback as a potent yet underused technique in the field of Animal behaviour. I present a concise review of studies that have used interactive playback thus far, describe how it can be applied, and discuss its limitations and challenges. My hope is that this review will result in more scientists applying this innovative technique to their own study subjects, as a means of furthering our understanding of the function of signalling interactions in Animal Communication systems.
Eileen A. Hebets - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Using cross-disciplinary knowledge to facilitate advancements in Animal Communication and science Communication research.
The Journal of experimental biology, 2018Co-Authors: Eileen A. Hebets, Alissa AndersonAbstract:Although humans may have more nuanced reasons for communicating - e.g. to teach or inform, to share or change opinions or attitudes - all Animals engage in Communication with members of their own as well as other species, and there are more similarities than differences between non-human and human Communication. All Communication systems are composed of the same basic elements and all face comparable challenges. In this Commentary, we explore the extent to which research investigating how non-human Animals communicate with each other (Animal Communication) overlaps in questions and approaches with research focused on how humans communicate with each other. We place a special focus on human Communication involving scientific content, i.e. science Communication. We begin with a brief review of the fields of Animal Communication and science Communication. We next synthesize literature from each field to examine the roles, impacts and potential interactions of Communication system elements - signaling environments, signalers, signal form and receivers - on effective Communication. We find that research examining Animal and human Communication, including science Communication, often has different emphases. Animal Communication research, for example, tends to focus more on the role of the signaling environment through quantification of receiver responses. In contrast, science Communication research currently emphasizes relationship building between signalers and receivers, and quantifies aspects of the receiver's psychology. Informed by our cross-disciplinary assessment, we propose potentially productive avenues of future research in both Animal Communication and science Communication.
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Dynamic changes in display architecture and function across environments revealed by a systems approach to Animal Communication.
Evolution; international journal of organic evolution, 2018Co-Authors: Malcolm F. Rosenthal, Matthew R. Wilkins, Daizaburo Shizuka, Eileen A. HebetsAbstract:Animal Communication is often structurally complex and dynamic, with signaler and receiver behavior varying in response to multiple environmental factors. To date, studies assessing signal dynamics have mostly focused on the relationships between select signaling traits and receiver responses in a single environment. We use the wolf spider Schizocosa floridana to explore the relationships between courtship display form and function across two social contexts (female presence vs absence) and two light environments (light vs dark). We use traditional analytical methods to determine predictors of copulation success (i.e., signal function) and examine these predictors in a structural context by overlaying them on signal phenotype networks (Wilkins et al. 2015). This allows us to explore system design principles (degeneracy, redundancy, pluripotentiality), providing insight into hypotheses regarding complex signal evolution. We found that both social context and light environment affect courtship structure, although the predictors of mating success remain similar across light environments, suggesting system degeneracy. Contrastingly, the same display traits may serve different functions across social environments, suggesting pluripotentiality. Ultimately, our network approach uncovers a complexity in display structure and function that is missed by functional analyses alone, highlighting the importance of systems-based methodologies for understanding the dynamic nature of complex signals.
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A systems approach to Animal Communication
Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2016Co-Authors: Eileen A. Hebets, Andrew B. Barron, Christopher N. Balakrishnan, Mark E. Hauber, Paul H. Mason, Kim L. HokeAbstract:Why Animal Communication displays are so complex and how they have evolved are active foci of research with a long and rich history. Progress towards an evolutionary analysis of signal complexity, however, has been constrained by a lack of hypotheses to explain similarities and/or differences in signalling systems across taxa. To address this, we advocate incorporating a systems approach into studies of Animal Communication—an approach that includes comprehensive experimental designs and data collection in combination with the implementation of systems concepts and tools. A systems approach evaluates overall display architecture, including how components interact to alter function, and how function varies in different states of the system. We provide a brief overview of the current state of the field, including a focus on select studies that highlight the dynamic nature of Animal signalling. We then introduce core concepts from systems biology (redundancy, degeneracy, pluripotentiality, and modularity) and discuss their relationships with system properties (e.g. robustness, flexibility, evolvability). We translate systems concepts into an Animal Communication framework and accentuate their utility through a case study. Finally, we demonstrate how consideration of the system-level organization of Animal Communication poses new practical research questions that will aid our understanding of how and why Animal displays are so complex.
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New dimensions in Animal Communication: the case for complexity
Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences, 2016Co-Authors: Gail L. Patricelli, Eileen A. HebetsAbstract:Animal Communication has multiple dimensions of complexity — signals may be variable over time and space; signals may have multiple components interacting with each other and with the receivers’ perceptual and cognitive systems; and signalers and receivers may adjust their behavior with changes in their environment. There is an increasing appreciation that understanding Animal Communication — especially the diversity of signal form — requires us to examine complexity per se. We review recent methods and conceptual frameworks that address the complexity of Communication with a specific focus on new developments in quantifying and explaining signal variation, new advances in understanding receiver psychology, including perceptual and cognitive biases, and new unifying frameworks, such as systems theory, which provide a holistic view of complex Communication systems.
Leonardo Francisco Barón Birchenall - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Animal Communication and Human Language: An overview
International Journal of Comparative Psychology, 2016Co-Authors: Leonardo Francisco Barón BirchenallAbstract:Comparative research has proven to be a fruitful field of study on the ontogenetic and phylogenetic evolution of language, and on the cognitive capacities unique to humans or shared with other Animals. The degree of continuity between components of human language and non-human Animal Communication systems, as well as the existence of a core factor of language, are polemic subjects at present. In this article, we offer an overview of the research on Animal Communication, comparing the resulting data with the current knowledge on human language development. We try to summarize what is currently known about “language abilities” in multiple Animals, and compare those facts to what is known about human language. The aim of the article is to provide an introduction to this particular topic, presenting the different sides of the arguments when possible. A special reference is made to the question of syntactic recursion as the main component of language, allegedly absent among non-human Animals. We conclude that the current state of knowledge supports the existence of a certain degree of continuity between different aspects of Animal Communication and human language, including the syntactic domain.
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Animal Communication and Human Language: An overview - eScholarship
International Journal of Comparative Psychology, 2016Co-Authors: Leonardo Francisco Barón BirchenallAbstract:Comparative research has proven to be a fruitful field of study on the ontogenetic and phylogenetic evolution of language, and on the cognitive capacities unique to humans or shared with other Animals. The degree of continuity between components of human language and non-human Animal Communication systems, as well as the existence of a core factor of language, are polemic subjects at present. In this article, we offer an overview of the research on Animal Communication, comparing the resulting data with the current knowledge on human language development. We try to summarize what is currently known about “language abilities” in multiple Animals, and compare those facts to what is known about human language. The aim of the article is to provide an introduction to this particular topic, presenting the different sides of the arguments when possible. A special reference is made to the question of syntactic recursion as the main component of language, allegedly absent among non-human Animals. We conclude that the current state of knowledge supports the existence of a certain degree of continuity between different aspects of Animal Communication and human language, including the syntactic domain.
Jarmo K. Holopainen - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Plant–Animal Communication.
Annals of Botany, 2012Co-Authors: Jarmo K. HolopainenAbstract:There are numerous excellent books about plant–pollinator and plant–herbivore interactions, and books about plant defence, but none of these covers the process of Communication between plants and Animals as comprehensively as this volume. The authors define Communication as occuring ‘if traits of the sender stimulate the sensory systems of the receiver in such a way as to cause a change in the behaviour of the receiver’. In most cases the signal – visual, olfactory, gustatory or acoustic – is released by the plant. The focus in this book is on olfactory and visual signals. In addition, the authors give examples of how insects can detect plant quality just by walking on it and sensing the taste with gustatory sensors in their legs. Acoustic Communication is exemplified by the noise of fruit falling into water, where fruit-feeding fish are alerted to this food source, eat the fruit and subsequently disperse seeds. Acoustic Communication is also linked to bat-pollinated plants, which have mirror-like structures in their flowers to strongly reflect bat echolocation calls back to the sender. The authors have taken an evolutionary ecological approach, setting the key questions of whether Communication between plants and Animals is primarily adaptive or whether it is a by-product of other selective pressures. The book has eleven chapters, including ones on Animal sensory ecology and biochemistry, Animals as seed dispersers, visual and non-visual fruit traits, floral Communication and pollination, plant crypsis, aposematism and mimicry, chemical Communication between plants and herbivores, and sensory aspects of carnivorous plants. Chapter 7 is devoted to the potential for leaf colouration to communicate to Animals. When the evolutionary biologist W. D. Hamilton and colleagues presented the co-evolutionary theory to explain the autumn colouration of temperate tree foliage, it stimulated research on leaf colouration and provoked a rather heated debate between supporters and critics. Theory suggests that intensity of colouration is a signal revealing the defensive commitment of the individual plant, and autumn-migrating insects use this signal to select less-defended plants. Of the book's authors, Schaefer has shown a critical attitude towards the autumn leaf co-evolution hypothesis in his earlier publications, but the review and analysis of the issue in this book is very balanced. The authors suggest more choice trials to test the hypothesis and to assess different selective pressures that might contribute to the relationship between leaf colouration and insect choice. The four-page colour plates in the book give good examples of visual Communication. The illustration of functional camouflage, showing how differently coloured, folivorous insects can take advantage of the variable colours of leaf venation when positioned on leaves, is particularly educational. The redrawn black and white figures are clear and informative throughout the book. The book covers most of the aspects related to biological Communication between plants and Animals, particularly in terrestrial ecosystems. As the ecosystems of our planet are facing extremely rapid changes due to human activity, the impacts of environmental disturbance on plant–Animal Communication ought to have deserved its own chapter, or better treatment in the future perspectives section of each chapter. Changes in plant–Animal interactions are considered one of the most sensitive indicators of environmental and climatic change, and the change is often attributed to a dramatic decline in Communication. A good example is the function of plant scents as long-distance Communication signals in ecological communities, with essential roles in a range of interactions. These molecules display sensitivity to present-day atmospheric pollutants resulting in much faster degradation of molecular structure and shorter Communication ranges than in pre-industrial atmospheres (e.g. McFrederick et al., 2009). When this loss of Communication by long-distance olfactory signals is combined with the current trend for faster fragmentation of the natural habitats of many plant and Animal species, we may better understand ecologically important trends such as the swift decline of pollinators across the world. Perhaps the next edition of this book could discuss if evolution of plant–Animal Communication is fast enough to respond to this anthropogenic challenge. Otherwise, the authors have put together an excellent book on Communication, ranging from sensory ecology to plant physiology, evolution and the behavioural sciences. For researchers it will give a critical synthesis of the current literature in the diverse field of biological Communication research. For students it will be an excellent source of information for advanced courses related to botany, zoology, pollination biology, evolution and ecology.
Henrik Brumm - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Animal Communication and Noise - Animal Communication and noise
Animal Signals and Communication, 2013Co-Authors: Henrik BrummAbstract:1 Introduction Henrik Brumm Part I: Signal Detection Theory 2 Signal Detection, Noise, and the Evolution of Communication R. Haven Wiley Part II: Acoustic Signals 3 Masking by Noise in Acoustic Insects: Problems and Solutions Heiner Romer 4 Effects of Noise on Sound Detection and Acoustic Communication in Fishes Friedrich Ladich 5 Anuran Acoustic Signal Production in Noisy Environments Joshua J. Schwartz and Mark A. Bee 6 Anuran Acoustic Signal Perception in Noisy Environments Alejandro Velez, Joshua J. Schwartz, and Mark A. Bee 7 Avian Vocal Production in Noise Henrik Brumm and Sue Anne Zollinger 8 Avian Sound Perception in Noise Robert J. Dooling and Sandra H. Blumenrath 9 Effects of Noise on Acoustic Signal Production in Marine Mammals. Peter L. Tyack and Vincent M. Janik 10 Effects of Noise on Sound Perception in Marine Mammals James J. Finneran and Brian K. Branstetter Part III: Optical, Electric, and Chemical Signals 11 Noise in Visual Communication: Motion from Wind-Blown Plants Richard A Peters 12 Neural Noise in Electro Communication -from Burden to Benefits Jan Benda, Jan Grewe and Rudiger Krahe 13 Noise in Chemical Communication Volker Nehring, Tristram D. Wyatt and Patrizia d'Ettorre Part IV: Impacts of Anthropogenic Noise 14. Anthropogenic Noise and Conservation Peter K. McGregor, Andrew G. Horn, Marty L. Leonard and, Frank Thomsen
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Animal Communication and noise
2013Co-Authors: Henrik BrummAbstract:1 Introduction Henrik Brumm Part I: Signal Detection Theory 2 Signal Detection, Noise, and the Evolution of Communication R. Haven Wiley Part II: Acoustic Signals 3 Masking by Noise in Acoustic Insects: Problems and Solutions Heiner Romer 4 Effects of Noise on Sound Detection and Acoustic Communication in Fishes Friedrich Ladich 5 Anuran Acoustic Signal Production in Noisy Environments Joshua J. Schwartz and Mark A. Bee 6 Anuran Acoustic Signal Perception in Noisy Environments Alejandro Velez, Joshua J. Schwartz, and Mark A. Bee 7 Avian Vocal Production in Noise Henrik Brumm and Sue Anne Zollinger 8 Avian Sound Perception in Noise Robert J. Dooling and Sandra H. Blumenrath 9 Effects of Noise on Acoustic Signal Production in Marine Mammals. Peter L. Tyack and Vincent M. Janik 10 Effects of Noise on Sound Perception in Marine Mammals James J. Finneran and Brian K. Branstetter Part III: Optical, Electric, and Chemical Signals 11 Noise in Visual Communication: Motion from Wind-Blown Plants Richard A Peters 12 Neural Noise in Electro Communication -from Burden to Benefits Jan Benda, Jan Grewe and Rudiger Krahe 13 Noise in Chemical Communication Volker Nehring, Tristram D. Wyatt and Patrizia d'Ettorre Part IV: Impacts of Anthropogenic Noise 14. Anthropogenic Noise and Conservation Peter K. McGregor, Andrew G. Horn, Marty L. Leonard and, Frank Thomsen
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Animal Communication: Timing counts
Current biology : CB, 2007Co-Authors: Henrik Brumm, Peter J. B. SlaterAbstract:Collective signalling in Animals has fascinated biologists for a long time. A recent study on Australian songbirds sheds new light on the function of highly coordinated avian duets.
