scholarly journals Rethinking recognition: social context in adult life rather than early experience shapes recognition in a social wasp

2020 ◽  
Vol 375 (1802) ◽  
pp. 20190468 ◽  
Author(s):  
Federico Cappa ◽  
Alessandro Cini ◽  
Lisa Signorotti ◽  
Rita Cervo
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Social Insects ◽  
Life Experience ◽  
Adult Life ◽  
Experimental Tests ◽  
Later Life ◽  
Social Wasp ◽  
Social Recognition ◽  
Sensitive Period ◽  
The Social

Social recognition represents the foundation of social living. To what extent social recognition is hard-wired by early-life experience or flexible and influenced by social context of later life stages is a crucial question in animal behaviour studies. Social insects have represented classic models to investigate the subject, and the acknowledged idea is that relevant information to create the referent template for nest-mate recognition (NMR) is usually acquired during an early sensitive period in adult life. Experimental evidence, however, highlighted that other processes may also be at work in creating the template and that such a template may be updated during adult life according to social requirements. However, currently, we lack an ad hoc experiment testing the alternative hypotheses at the basis of NMR ontogeny in social insects. Thus, to investigate the mechanisms underlying the ontogeny of NMR in Polistes wasps, a model genus in recognition studies, and their different role in determining recognition abilities, we subjected Polistes dominula workers to different olfactory experiences in different phases of their life before inserting them into the social environment of a novel colony and testing them in recognition bioassays. Our results show that workers develop their NMR abilities based on their social context rather than through pre-imaginal and early learning or self-referencing. Our study demonstrates that the social context represents the major component shaping recognition abilities in a social wasp, therefore shedding new light on the ontogeny of recognition in paper wasps and prompting the reader to rethink about the traditional knowledge at the basis of the recognition in social insects. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Signal detection theory in recognition systems: from evolving models to experimental tests'.

The Social Context and Resources of the Unmarried in Old Age

1986 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 81-96 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pat M. Keith
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Life Course ◽  
Old Age ◽  
Social Relationships ◽  
Later Life ◽  
Social Resources ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Role Transitions ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Life Course

A model of singleness in later life was developed to show how the social context may influence the personal and social resources of older, unmarried persons. The unmarried (especially the divorced) will be an increasing proportion of the aged population in the future, and they will require more services than will the married. Role transitions of the unmarried over the life course, finances, health, and social relationships of older singles are discussed with implications for practice and future research.

The Effects of Limited Work Opportunities on Transitions to Adulthood among Young Refugees in Uganda and Jordan

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wayne Shand ◽  
Lorraine van Blerk ◽  
Laura Prazeres ◽  
Badru Bukenya ◽  
Rawan Ibrahim ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Adult Life ◽  
Social Recognition ◽  
Policy Support ◽  
Transitions To Adulthood ◽  
The Social ◽  
Displaced Children ◽  
Legal Restrictions ◽  
Individual Ability ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Young people constitute more than half of global refugee populations, yet there is limited research into the impact of displacement on transitions into adult life. With the average period of protracted displacement extending beyond 20 years, insight is needed into how the experience of being a refugee shapes the expectations and lives of young people. This article examines the effects of weak and restricted labour markets on the transitions of young refugees into adulthood. Drawing from research undertaken with displaced children and youth in Uganda and Jordan, the article explores how a lack of work opportunities affects individual ability to achieve financial independence and, more widely, to obtain the social recognition associated with adulthood. The research finds how a dependence on precarious work and the effects of legal restrictions on employment curtail transitions to adulthood, highlighting the importance of national and humanitarian policy support to help young refugees establish stable livelihoods.

scholarly journals Association of early- and adult-life socioeconomic circumstances with muscle strength in older age

2018 ◽  
Vol 47 (3) ◽  
pp. 398-407 ◽  
Author(s):  
Boris Cheval ◽  
Matthieu P Boisgontier ◽  
Dan Orsholits ◽  
Stefan Sieber ◽  
Idris Guessous ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Muscle Strength ◽  
Early Life ◽  
Adult Life ◽  
Health Behaviours ◽  
Later Life ◽  
Older Age ◽  
Sensitive Period ◽  
Future Health ◽  
Mixed Effect ◽  
Wide Range

Abstract Background socioeconomic circumstances (SEC) during a person’s lifespan influence a wide range of health outcomes. However, solid evidence of the association of early- and adult-life SEC with health trajectories in ageing is still lacking. This study assessed whether early-life SEC are associated with muscle strength in later life—a biomarker of health—and whether this relationship is caused by adult-life SEC and health behaviours. Methods we used data from the Survey of Health Ageing and Retirement in Europe, a 12-year population-based cohort study with repeated measurement in six waves (2004–15) and retrospective collection of life-course data. Participants’ grip strength was assessed by using a handheld dynamometer. Confounder-adjusted logistic mixed-effect models were used to examine the associations of early- and adult-life SEC with the risk of low muscle strength (LMS) in older age. Results a total of 24,179 participants (96,375 observations) aged 50–96 living in 14 European countries were included in the analyses. Risk of LMS was increased with disadvantaged relative to advantaged early-life SEC. The association between risk of LMS and disadvantaged early-life SEC gradually decreased when adjusting for adult-life SEC for both sexes and with unhealthy behaviours for women. After adjusting for these factors, all associations between risk of LMS and early-life SEC remained significant for women. Conclusion early-life SEC are associated with muscle strength after adjusting for adult-life SEC and behavioural lifestyle factors, especially in women, which suggests that early life may represent a sensitive period for future health.

Pre-imaginal biasing of caste in a primitively eusocial insect

1988 ◽  
Vol 233 (1271) ◽  
pp. 175-189 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Adult Life ◽  
Social Wasp ◽  
Caste Differentiation ◽  
Egg Laying ◽  
Ropalidia Marginata ◽  
Eusocial Insect ◽  
Eusocial Insects ◽  
Insect Societies ◽  
The Social ◽  
Primitively Eusocial

Primitively eusocial insects often lack morphological caste differentiation, leading to considerable flexibility in the social and reproductive roles that the adult insects may adopt. Although this flexibility and its consequences for social organization have received much attention there has been relatively little effort to detect any pre-imaginal effects leading to a bias in the potential caste of eclosing females. Experiments reported here show that only about 50 % of eclosing females of the tropical social wasp Ropalidia marginata build nests and lay eggs, in spite of being isolated from all conspecifics and being provided ad libitum food since eclosion. The number of empty cells in the parent nest, which we believe to be an indication of the queen’s declining influence, and a wasp’s own rate of feeding during adult life predict the probability of egg laying by eclosing females. These results call for an examination of the possibility that all females in primitively eusocial insect societies are not potentially capable of becoming egg layers and that reigning queens and possibly other adults exert an influence on the production of new queens.

Pre-morbid personality in the functional psychoses of the senium. A comparison of ex-patients with healthy controls

1962 ◽  
Vol 108 (457) ◽  
pp. 790-800 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raul H. Vispo
Keyword(s):  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Elderly Person ◽  
Adult Life ◽  
Social Situation ◽  
Later Life ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Ageing Process ◽  
The Social ◽  
The University

In the last few years many studies have appeared relating directly or indirectly to the role of adjustment in the ageing process. What factors influence the adaptability of the elderly person to his or her own disability, isolation or approaching death? In general the studies done by sociologists stress the importance of the social situation in which these persons find themselves. P. Townsend's book “The Family Life of Old People” (1957), the articles of Havighurst (1958) and his group in Chicago, and of Post (1958) are examples of this view. In what may be regarded in some way as a reaction to this tendency, we have the theory of disengagement of Cumming et al. (1960), in which “ageing is seen as an inevitable mental withdrawal or disengagement resulting in decreased interaction between the ageing person and others in the social system to which they belong”. But it is Irving Rosow (1960) who emphasizes this point more clearly. After critically reviewing diverse approaches, he states (and I quote from different paragraphs throughout his paper), “The root of the problem lies in regarding adjustment as a state or a condition at a point in time”. “What gerontologists have called adjustment is actually the result of the product of the ageing process”. “Thus it follows that the only way to evaluate conditions in later life is to compare them with some earlier patterns”. From there on he presents his own sociological theory of adjustment. Strengthening this view still further, a psychologist, Robert Peck (1960), reporting on one phase of the “Kansas Study of Adult Life” by the University of Chicago Committee on Human Development writes, “Adjustment to middle age and old age, in so far as it has been measured in this research, seems largely determined by personality characteristics which have been laid down earlier in life”. It is psychiatrists, however, who have insisted on the importance of the previous personality in the problems related to ageing, as may be noted in the publications of Cameron (1956) and Roth (1959).

Analytical Legal Research for Expounding the Legal Wor(l)d

2020 ◽  
pp. 169-197
Author(s):  
P. Ishwara Bhat
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Social Recognition ◽  
Legal Research ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
The Social ◽  
Analysis And Synthesis ◽  
Analytical Research ◽  
Legal Concepts ◽  
Constitutional Jurisprudence

Analytical research aims at exposition of law and legal concepts by looking at its source, the power behind it, the interconnections with norms at different hierarchies, and the force behind it which may reflect social recognition. It is essential to focus on meanings, silences, and relations in order to bring out the meaning. Since language is born in a social context words are to be understood by looking at the social context. Gaps and interstices of law are to be filled up by exploring the hidden ideas by reading between the lines. Relations are also resources of meaning. In order to analyse the law, determining its status in the hierarchy of legal norms is necessary. In international law, constitutional jurisprudence, law of precedents, and common law we come across the norms governing hierarchy. Once law is located, finding its meaning through analysis and synthesis is the step to be taken.

The Social Context of Sedentary Behaviors and Their Relationships With Health in Later Life

2019 ◽  
Vol 27 (6) ◽  
pp. 797-806 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Russell ◽  
Jo-Ana D. Chase
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Social Engagement ◽  
Later Life ◽  
Sociodemographic Characteristics ◽  
Sedentary Behaviors ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Television Watching ◽  
The Social ◽  
Race Ethnicity

This study examined sedentary behaviors among older adults and explored associations with social context and health measures using cross-sectional data from the National Health and Aging Trends Study (N = 1,687). Multivariate models were estimated to explore associations of time in six sedentary behaviors (i.e., television watching, sitting and talking, hobbies, computer use, driving, and resting) with sociodemographic characteristics and level of social engagement and with health status. Results indicated substantial variability in sedentary behaviors, with television watching being the most frequent and resting the least frequent activities. Sedentary behaviors varied by sociodemographic characteristics, including age, race/ethnicity, and education, as well as by level of social engagement. Television watching and resting, but not other behaviors, were associated with poorer health. These findings help to unpack the role of social context in sedentary behaviors and could inform public health interventions aimed at reducing time spent in behaviors that are adversely associated with health.

scholarly journals Ability to modulate birdsong across social contexts develops without imitative social learning

2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 20170777 ◽  
Author(s):  
Logan S. James ◽  
Jennifer B. Dai ◽  
Jon T. Sakata
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Social Learning ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Taeniopygia Guttata ◽  
Sensitive Period ◽  
Zebra Finches ◽  
Acoustic Structure ◽  
The Social ◽  
Courtship Songs ◽  
Temporal Structures

Many important behaviours are socially learned. For example, the acoustic structure of courtship songs in songbirds is learned by listening to and interacting with conspecifics during a sensitive period in development. Signallers modify the spectral and temporal structures of their vocalizations depending on the social context, but the degree to which this modulation requires imitative social learning remains unknown. We found that male zebra finches ( Taeniopygia guttata ) that were not exposed to context-dependent song modulations throughout development significantly modulated their song in ways that were typical of socially reared birds. Furthermore, the extent of these modulations was not significantly different between finches that could or could not observe these modulations during tutoring. These data suggest that this form of vocal flexibility develops without imitative social learning in male zebra finches.

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