Behavioral Mechanisms in Evolutionary Ecology

About this book

The first book-length exploration of the behavioural mechanisms in evolutionary ecology, this ambitious volume illuminates long-standing questions about cause-and-effect relations between an animal's behaviour and its environment. By focusing on biological mechanisms - the sum of an animal's cognitive, neural, developmental, and hormonal processes - leading researchers demonstrate how the integrated study of animal physiology, cognitive processes, and social interaction can yield an enriched understanding of behaviour. The studies range from insects to primates, with the contributors examining how various animals identify and use environmental resources and deal with ecological constraints, as well as the roles of learning, communication, and cognitive aspects of social interaction in behavioural evolution.

Contents

Contents 1 How to Think about Behavior: An Introduction, Leslie A. Real Part I. Psychological and Cognitive Foundations 2 A Synthetic Approach to the Study of Animal Intelligence, Alan C. Kamil 3 Learning and Foraging: Individuals, Groups, and Populations, John R. Krebs and Alastair J. Inman 4 Spatial Cognition and Navigation in Insects, Fred C. Dyer 5 Information Processing and the Evolutionary Ecology of Cognitive Architecture, Leslie A. Real 6 Optimizing Learning and Its Effect on Evolutionary Change in Behavior, Daniel R. Papaj Part II. Communication 7 Errors, Exaggeration, and Deception in Animal Communication, R. Haven Wiley 8 Mechanisms Underlying Sexual Selection, Michael J. Ryan Part III. Neural, Developmental, and Genetic Processes 9 Critical Events in the Development of Bird Song: What Can Neurobiology Contribute to the Study of the Evolution of Behavior?, Arthur P. Arnold 10 The Nature and Nurture of Neo-phenotypes: A Case History, Meredith J. West, Andrew P. King, and Todd M. Freeberg 11 Constraints on Phenotypic Evolution, Stevan J. Arnold 12 Behavioral Constraints on the Evolutionary Expansion of Insect Diet: A Case History from Checkerspot Butterflies, Michael C. Singer 13 Individual Behavior and Higher-Order Species Interactions, Earl E. Werner Part IV. Hormonal Processes 14 Hormones and Life Histories: An Integrative Approach, Ellen D. Ketterson and Val Nolan Jr. 15 Immunology and the Evolution of Behavior, Marlene Zuk Part V. The Social Context of Behavior 16 The Evolution of Social Cognition in Primates, Robert M. Seyfarth and Dorothy L. Cheney 17 Lanchester' Theory of Combat, Self-Organization, and the Evolution of Army Ants and Cellular Societies, Nigel R. Franks and Lucas W. Partridge 18 How Social Insect Colonies Respond to Variable Environments, Deborah M. Gordon 19 Chaos and Behavior: The Perspective of Nonlinear Dynamics, Blaine J. Cole

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