vendredi 15 novembre 2024

PhD opportunity: Corvid communication in the wild

 

 
Corvids calling: understanding the origins of complex communication 
Supervisors:  
Alex Thornton, Centre for Ecology and Conservation, University of Exeter, Penryn Campus,  
Andrew King, Biosciences, Swansea
Ines Fuertbauer, Biosciences, Swansea 
Neeltje Boogert, CEC, University of Exeter 
We are looking for a highly motivated, talented student with broad interests in animal behaviour, cognition and communication. The project will be based at the University of Exeter’s Penryn Campus in beautiful Cornwall with additional work in Swansea. 
Full details of how to apply are here: 
If you have any questions about the project, please write to alex.thornton@exeter.ac.uk
Project Summary (see attached pdf for details)
Animals have diverse acoustic communication systems, from the chirping of crickets to the almost infinite complexity of human language, and these systems play a vital role in enabling cooperation and structuring societies. Most attempts to understand the causes of this variation use between-species comparisons. These have examined, for instance, whether social or ecological variables predict characteristics of communication systems, such as whether vocalisations are individually distinctive, or the number of different vocalisations used. However, these comparative, correlational approaches tell us little about the benefits individuals derive from communication and ignore the possibility that benefits vary across different contexts.
An alternative, more powerful approach is to harness within-species variation to understand how and why individuals use different signals to solve diverse challenges. Jackdaws, birds of the large-brained corvid family, provide an ideal system as they live in highly variable social environments, some of their calls are known to be individually distinctive, and they use vocalisations to solve diverse problems. Jackdaw societies centre around long-term, monogamous pair-bonds, but pairs are embedded in dynamic social networks within breeding colonies and members of different colonies forage together and form vast winter flocks numbering thousands of individuals. Our established study sites contain thousands of individually recognisable, PIT-tagged jackdaws, providing unique opportunities to understand the development and function of vocal communication across these diverse contexts.