Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
Department of Bioscience, Wildlife Ecology, Aarhus University, Rønde, Denmark.
PLoS One. 2021 Jun 9;16(6):e0252374. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0252374. eCollection 2021.
Animals regularly use social information to make fitness-relevant decisions. Particularly in social interactions, social information can reduce uncertainty about the relative quality of conspecifics, thus optimising decisions on with whom and how to interact. One important resource for individuals living in social environments is the production of information by signalling conspecifics. Recent research has suggested that some species of parrots engage in affiliative contact call matching and that these interactions may be available to conspecific unintended receivers. However, it remains unclear what information third parties may gain from contact call matching and how it can be utilised during flock decisions. Here, using a combined choice and playback experiment, we investigated the flock fusion choices and vocal behaviour of a social parrot species, the orange-fronted conure (Eupsittula canicularis), to a contact call matching interaction between two individuals of different sexes and with different vocal roles. Our results revealed that orange-fronted conures chose to follow vocal leaders more often than vocal followers during fusions. Furthermore, flocks responded with higher call rates and matched the stimulus calls closer when subsequently choosing a vocal leader. Interestingly, orange-fronted conures also showed higher contact call rates and closer matches when choosing males over females. These results suggest that paying attention to conspecific contact call interactions can provide individuals with social information that can be utilised during fission and fusion events, significantly influencing the social dynamics of orange-fronted conures.
动物经常利用社交信息来做出与适应度相关的决策。特别是在社交互动中，社交信息可以减少对同种个体相对质量的不确定性，从而优化与谁互动以及如何互动的决策。对于生活在社交环境中的个体来说，一种重要的资源是通过向同种个体发出信号来产生信息。最近的研究表明，一些鹦鹉物种会进行亲和性接触鸣叫匹配，并且这些互动可能会被同种的非预期接收者获得。然而，目前尚不清楚第三方可以从接触鸣叫匹配中获得什么信息，以及在群体决策中如何利用这些信息。在这里，我们使用了一个组合选择和回放实验，研究了一种社交鹦鹉物种——橙额鹦鹉（Eupsittula canicularis）的群体融合选择和发声行为，该实验涉及到两个不同性别和具有不同发声角色的个体之间的接触鸣叫匹配互动。我们的结果表明，橙额鹦鹉在融合过程中更倾向于跟随发声领导者，而不是跟随发声追随者。此外，当随后选择发声领导者时，鸟群会以更高的鸣叫率做出反应，并更接近刺激鸣叫进行匹配。有趣的是，橙额鹦鹉在选择雄性个体而不是雌性个体时，也表现出更高的接触鸣叫率和更接近的匹配。这些结果表明，关注同种个体的接触鸣叫互动可以为个体提供社交信息，这些信息可以在分裂和融合事件中得到利用，显著影响橙额鹦鹉的社会动态。
