A talk I presented at Behavior 2011: Joint Meeting of the Animal Behavior Society and International Ethological Conference (Bloomington, IN), summarizing my dissertation.
You can find more information on the research presented here at: https://impactstory.org/TinaWey and https://sites.google.com/site/tweyresearch/home
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Social attributes in yellow-bellied marmots
1. Quantifying social attributes and their
consequences in yellow-bellied marmots
Tina W. Wey1
& Daniel T. Blumstein2
1
University of California, Davis; twwey@ucdavis.edu
2
University of California, Los Angeles; marmots@ucla.edu
Tom Uhlman
2. Causes and consequences of
sociality
Sociality is widespread and varied
Questions
Why is there social variation?
What are the consequences of social variation?
Multiple levels
Proximate and ultimate causes of sociality
Individual and group variation
Many ways to quantify sociality
5. Outline
Social network structure and consequences in
yellow-bellied marmots
How are marmot social networks structured at
multiple levels?
Do individual social attributes have fitness
correlates?
12. Network structure – “Friendly” and
“unfriendly” networks differ
Measure Affiliative Agonistic
Density
N = 24
Z = -3.741
P < 0.001
13. Network structure – “Friendly” and
“unfriendly” networks differ
Measure Affiliative Agonistic
Density
Reciprocity
N = 24
Z = -3.741
P < 0.001
N = 24
Z = -3.657
P < 0.001
14. Network structure – “Friendly” and
“unfriendly” networks differ
Measure Affiliative Agonistic
Density
Reciprocity
Clustering
coefficient
N = 24
Z = -3.741
P < 0.001
N = 24
Z = -3.657
P < 0.001
N = 24
Z = -0.343
P < 0.001
15. Dyadic structure
Wey & Blumstein 2010 Animal Behaviour
Age and kinship influence affiliation preference
Marmots are more friendly to others in the same age class and
closer relatives
Less consistent “rules” for who fights
Friendship Fighting
Age class
Sex
Kinship
16. Individual variation
Age and sex influence social tendencies
Older and male marmots are crankier
Older marmots receive fewer affiliations, and initiate more and
receive less aggression
Females receive affiliation from more partners, and males initiate
aggression to more
Affiliative Agonistic
Initiation Reception Initiation Reception
Age
Sex
Wey & Blumstein 2010 Animal Behaviour
17. Social variation can have
associated consequences
Individual social variation influences reproductive
success
Social bonds can improve fitness, especially for females
Aggression and dominance can result in differential fitness
Increased parasitism is often a cost of sociality
Increase with group size (Côté & Poulin 1995, Bordes et al. 2007)
Social behavior is expected to influence parasites (Møller et al.
1993, Altizer et al. 2003)
18. Consequences of individual social
variation in marmots
Background:
Dominance rank is associated with reproductive success in
males but not females (Huang et al. 2011 Ethology)
Larger males tend to be dominant
Social cohesion predicts female dispersal (Blumstein et al. 2009 Proc B)
Social variation is heritable (Lea et al. 2010 PNAS)
Predictions:
Social cohesion would improve female reproductive success
Aggression would predict males reproductive success
More social individuals would have more parasites
19. Consequences of individual social
variation in marmots
Defined social attributes
Measured fitness correlates
Annual reproductive success
Parasites – fleas and intestinal parasites
Fit separate mixed models with social variables as
predictors
Female and male reproductive success analyzed separately
Included a spatial component
Burrow overlap
20. Defining social attributes
Many possibly measures of connectivity, which reflect different but
related aspects of social connectivity
Degree Number of social partners
Out-degree Number social partners initiating to
In-degree Number social partners receiving from
Strength Total interactions (weighted degree)
Out-strength Total interactions initiated
In-strength Total interactions received
Closeness Overall connectivity in the network
Betweenness Importance as a connection point in the network
Embeddedness Social integration
22. Social cohesion did not improve
female reproductive success
Friendlier females had fewer offspring
Crowded females had fewer offspring
Affiliation
strength
Annual
reproductive
success
Spatial
overlap
Annual
reproductive
success
N = 228
P < 0.001
N = 228
P = 0.014
23. Size and aggression were important
for male reproductive success
Bigger males had more offspring
More aggressive males had more offspring
Relative
mass
Annual
reproductive
success
Bullying
Annual
reproductive
success
N = 44
P < 0.001
N = 44
P = 0.044
24. Parasites were not a cost of
sociality
Social factors did not influence ectoparasite or
endoparasite infection
Ectoparasites: fleas (N = 185)
Males had more fleas (P = 0.030)
Endoparasites: gut protozoa (N = 428)
No significant trends
Sociality Parasites
25. Summary
Social attributes explained reproductive success, but not
parasites
Friendlier females had lower reproductive success
Contrasts with more highly social species
Constraints and competition?
Male bullies had higher reproductive success
Consistent with results from dominance
Parasites do not appear to be a cost of sociality in marmots
Results differ from findings in other systems (Corner et al. 2003)
Consistent with previous research on group measures in marmots
(Arnold & Lichtenstein 1993, Van Vuren 1996)
26. Conclusions
Quantified and distinguished biologically
important attributes of sociality examine
structure and possible consequences
Examining social network variation offered
complimentary insights to other approaches
And with this data we then start to measure and test questions about social variation.
Predictions based on previous work in marmots and results form other animal and human social networks
Patterns consistent with other systems. Implications. Dyadic relationships.
Interpret in conjunction with earlier results.
Mention dispersal results
Mention dispersal results
Mention dispersal results
Interestingly, higher agonistic reception was not associated with lower reproductive success
Despite predictions from theory, an empirical test in this system found no relationship, although it remains to be seen in other systems. May be incorrect time scale or resolution to capture dynamics