Dataset Information

Reproductive skew affects social information use.

ABSTRACT: Individuals vary in their propensity to use social learning, the engine of cultural evolution, to acquire information about their environment. The causes of those differences, however, remain largely unclear. Using an agent-based model, we tested the hypothesis that as a result of reproductive skew differences in energetic requirements for reproduction affect the value of social information. We found that social learning is associated with lower variance in yield and is more likely to evolve in risk-averse low-skew populations than in high-skew populations. Reproductive skew may also result in sex differences in social information use, as empirical data suggest that females are often more risk-averse than males. To explore how risk may affect sex differences in learning strategies, we simulated learning in sexually reproducing populations where one sex experiences more reproductive skew than the other. When both sexes compete for the same resources, they tend to adopt extreme strategies: the sex with greater reproductive skew approaches pure individual learning and the other approaches pure social learning. These results provide insight into the conditions that promote individual and species level variation in social learning and so may affect cultural evolution.

SUBMITTER: Smolla M

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6689588 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Reproductive skew affects social information use.

Smolla Marco M Rosher Charlotte C Gilman R Tucker RT Shultz Susanne S

Royal Society open science 20190703 7

Individuals vary in their propensity to use social learning, the engine of cultural evolution, to acquire information about their environment. The causes of those differences, however, remain largely unclear. Using an agent-based model, we tested the hypothesis that as a result of reproductive skew differences in energetic requirements for reproduction affect the value of social information. We found that social learning is associated with lower variance in yield and is more likely to evolve in ...[more]

PMID: 31417699

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Project description:Social plasticity is a pervasive feature of animal behavior. Animals adjust the expression of their social behavior to the daily changes in social life and to transitions between life-history stages, and the ability to change in these ways impacts their Darwinian fitness. This behavioral plasticity may be achieved either by rewiring or by biochemically switching nodes of the neural network underlying the social behavior in response to perceived social information. Independent of the proximate mechanisms, at the neuromolecular level social plasticity relies on the regulation of gene expression, such that different neurogenomic states emerge in response to different social stimuli and the switches between states are orchestrated by signaling pathways that interface the social environment and the genotype. Here, we test this hypothesis by characterizing the changes in the brain profile of gene expression in response to social odors in the Mozambique Tilapia, Oreochromis mossambicus. This species has a rich repertoire of social behaviors during which both visual and chemical information are conveyed to conspecifics. Specifically, dominant males increase their urination frequency during agonist encounters and during courtship to convey chemical information reflecting their dominance status. We recorded electro-olfactograms to test the extent to which the olfactory epithelium can discriminate between olfactory information from dominant and subordinate males as well as from pre- and post-spawning females. We then performed a genome-scale gene expression analysis of the olfactory bulb and the olfactory cortex homolog in order to identify the neuromolecular systems involved in processing these social stimuli. Our results show that different olfactory stimuli from conspecificsM-bM-^@M-^Y have a major impact in the brain transcriptome, with different chemical social cues eliciting specific patterns of gene expression in the brain. These results confirm the role of rapid changes in gene expression in the brain as a genomic mechanism underlying behavioural plasticity and reinforce the idea of an extensive transcriptional plasticity of cichlid genomes, especially in response to rapid changes in their social environment. Brain samples from 40 African cichlid males, Oreochromis mossambicus were collected after stimulation with different social olfactory stimuli. Samples were collected from 2 brain areas: BO and Dp after males were exposed to dominant (DOM) and subordinate (SUB) male urine and pre- (PRE) and post-ovulatory (POST) female scent. In OB 5 replicates were collected from males exposed to DOM and 6 to the other stimuli. For Dp 5 replicates were collected from males exposed to DOM and POST, 4 to SUB and 6 to PRE.

Dataset Information

Reproductive skew affects social information use.

Publications

Reproductive skew affects social information use.

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