Male Pagurus minutus hermit crabs use multiple types of information in decisions to give up male-male contests.

ABSTRACT: Organisms use information to make adaptive decisions in various contexts, including aggression. Potentially weaker, but better-informed, contestants should give up earlier to reduce fighting costs by using information related to their own lower success such as their size relative to their opponent and past contest outcomes to make this choice. Here, we examined whether intruders of the hermit crab Pagurus minutus could use information about their (1) smaller size, (2) past contest defeats, (3) opponent's past wins, or (4) relationship in the dominance hierarchy to their opponent when making a decision to give up during male-male contests for a female. In all trials, we randomly matched a smaller intruder with a larger opponent that was guarding a female. Our analyses suggest that P. minutu

SUBMITTER: Yasuda CI 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10673833 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature