Fission-Fusion Dynamics and Social Cognition in Wild Ravens
Causes for the pronounced individual differences in fission-fusion dynamics of non-breeders and effects on the birds’ social knowledge about relationships
Project Details
Principal Investigator Prof. Dr. Thomas Bugnyar
Funding FWF – Austrian Science Fund
Programme Stand-Alone Project
Project Duration 14.11.2016-13.05.2020
Project Number P 29705
Research Objective
Raven non-breeders forage in groups at rich food sources. These groups are structured by social relationships, leading to a cognitively sophisticated system of dependent ranks. Yet, these groups are also characterized by high inter-individual variation in fission-fusion dynamics, with some birds staying at a foraging site over long time periods and others for a few days only. The interplay between spatio-temporal dynamics in social structure, the formation of social relationships and social cognition is little understood.
Research Questions
If certain individuals prefer to stay in a group, whereas others prefer to fission, this raises pressing questions like what factors determine their preferences and how do they relate to the subjects’ social skills and knowledge?
Team
Matthias-Claudio Loretto, PhD
Mario Gallego-Abenza, MSc