School of Biological Sciences, University of Bristol, Life Sciences Building, Tyndall Avenue, Bristol, BS8 1TQ, United Kingdom.
Bristol Veterinary School, University of Bristol, Langford House, Langford, North Somerset, BS40 5DU, United Kingdom.
Sci Rep. 2018 Jul 2;8(1):9978. doi: 10.1038/s41598-018-28378-x.
Animals in groups can benefit from synchronising their behaviour, where multiple individuals conduct similar activities at the same moment in time. Previous studies have demonstrated that some species show synchronisation of vigilance behaviour, but have not explored the mechanism driving this behaviour. Synchronisation could be driven by animals copying their closest neighbours, which would mean that close proximity should lead to increased synchronisation. We simultaneously observed the behaviour of multiple individual black-headed gulls (Chroicocephalus ridibundus) within resting groups, and compared the activity of a focal individual with its two closest neighbours and a randomly selected control individual. Focal individuals were more likely to be synchronised with their closest neighbour. Synchronisation became less likely if individuals were not the closest neighbour. This suggests that synchronisation seen within groups is dependent upon the spatial positions of its members, and black-headed gulls pay more attention to their closest neighbours.
群体中的动物可以从行为同步中受益，即多个个体在同一时间进行相似的活动。先前的研究表明，一些物种表现出警戒行为的同步，但尚未探索驱动这种行为的机制。同步可能是由动物模仿其最接近的邻居驱动的，这意味着近距离应该会导致同步增加。我们同时观察了多个个体黑头鸥（Chroicocephalus ridibundus）在休息群体中的行为，并将焦点个体的活动与其两个最接近的邻居和一个随机选择的对照个体进行了比较。焦点个体与最接近的邻居同步的可能性更大。如果个体不是最接近的邻居，同步的可能性就会降低。这表明群体内的同步取决于其成员的空间位置，而黑头鸥更关注其最接近的邻居。
