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. 2019 Dec:158:1-7.
doi: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2019.10.004.

Larger group sizes facilitate the emergence and spread of innovations in a group-living bird

Benjamin J Ashton  1   2 , Alex Thornton  3 , Amanda R Ridley  1
Affiliations

Larger group sizes facilitate the emergence and spread of innovations in a group-living bird

Benjamin J Ashton et al. Anim Behav. 2019 Dec.

Abstract

The benefits of group living have traditionally been attributed to risk dilution or the efficient exploitation of resources; individuals in social groups may therefore benefit from access to valuable information. If sociality facilitates access to information, then individuals in larger groups may be predicted to solve novel problems faster than individuals in smaller groups. Additionally, larger group sizes may facilitate the subsequent spread of innovations within animal groups, as has been proposed for human societies. We presented a novel foraging task (where a food reward could be accessed by pushing a self-shutting sliding door) to 16 groups of wild, cooperatively breeding Australian magpies, Cracticus tibicen dorsalis, ranging in size from two to 11 individuals. We found a nonlinear decline in the time taken for the innovative behaviour to emerge with increasing group size, and social information use facilitated the transmission of novel behaviour, with it spreading more quickly in larger than smaller groups. This study provides important evidence for a nonlinear relationship between group size and the emergence of innovation (and its subsequent transmission) in a wild population of animals. Further work investigating the scope and strength of group size-innovation relationships, and the mechanisms underpinning them, will help us understand the potential advantages of living in larger social groups.

Keywords: animal innovation; group size; pool of competence hypothesis.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Novel foraging task. Food rewards could be extracted by pushing the self-shutting sliding door either left or right.
Figure 2
Figure 2
The time (s) taken for innovative behaviour to emerge (once individuals first interact with the task) in relation to group size.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Survival curves showing the effect of group size on the spread of innovative behaviour within groups.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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