scholarly journals Male attention allocation depends on social context

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shelby D. Burridge ◽  
Ingo Schlupp ◽  
Amber M. Makowicz
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Social Environment ◽  
Attention Allocation ◽  
Social Environments ◽  
Relevant Stimulus ◽  
Stimulus Female ◽  
Amazon Molly ◽  
Poecilia Formosa ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Partners

AbstractAttention, although limited, is a mechanism used to filter large amounts of information and determine what stimuli are most relevant at a particular moment. In dynamic social environments, multiple individuals may play a pivotal role in any given interaction where a male’s attention may be divided between a rival, a current mate, and/or future potential mates. Here, we investigated impacts of the social environment on attention allocation in male sailfin mollies, Poecilia latipinna, which are a part of a sexual-unisexual mating system with the Amazon molly, Poecilia formosa. We asked: 1) Does the species of female influence the amount of attention a male allocates to her? And 2) Is a male’s attention towards his mate influenced by different social partners? Males direct more attention toward a stimulus female when she was a conspecific. We also show that males perceive a larger male as a more relevant stimulus to pay attention to than a smaller male, and a conspecific female as a more relevant stimulus compared to a heterospecific female. Our results show differential allocation of attention is dependent upon multiple components of the social environment in which an individual interacts.SignificanceThis study investigates how attention is allocated in males when presented with social distractions. Assuming that attentional capacity is finite, males may face a tradeoff between different cognitive-demanding stimuli, such as rival males and potential future mates, when mating. Here, we show that male attention allocation in both intra- and intersexual interactions is multifaceted and context dependent. This suggests that individuals within the social environment vary in how meaningful (i.e., able to capture attention) they are to males during mating encounters. Understanding how social partners can cause a shift of attention away from a mating opportunity is essential to understanding the influence of the social context on sexual selection.

scholarly journals Social environment drives sex and age-specific variation in Drosophila melanogaster microbiome composition and predicted function

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Leech ◽  
Laurin McDowall ◽  
Kevin P Hopkins ◽  
Steven M Sait ◽  
Xavier A. Harrison ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Social Environment ◽  
Social Contact ◽  
Social Effects ◽  
Social Environments ◽  
Microbiome Composition ◽  
Individual Health ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Partners ◽  
Host Health

AbstractSocial environments influence multiple traits of individuals including immunity, stress and ageing, often in sex-specific ways. The composition of the microbiome (the assemblage of symbiotic microorganisms within a host) is determined by environmental factors and the host’s immune, endocrine and neural systems. The social environment could alter host microbiomes extrinsically by affecting transmission between individuals, likely promoting homogeneity in the microbiome of social partners. Alternatively, intrinsic effects arising from interactions between the microbiome and host physiology (the microbiota-gut-brain axis) could translate social stress into dysbiotic microbiomes, with consequences for host health. We investigated how manipulating social environments during larval and adult life-stages altered the microbiome composition of Drosophila melanogaster fruit flies. We used social contexts that particularly alter the development and lifespan of males, predicting that any intrinsic social effects on the microbiome would therefore be sex-specific. The presence of adult males during the larval stage significantly altered the microbiome of pupae of both sexes. In adults, same-sex grouping increased bacterial diversity in both sexes. Importantly, the microbiome community structure of males was more sensitive to social contact at older ages, an effect partially mitigated by housing focal males with young rather than co-aged groups. Functional analyses suggest that these microbiome changes impact ageing and immune responses. This is consistent with the hypothesis that the substantial effects of the social environment on individual health are mediated through intrinsic effects on the microbiome, and provides a model for understanding the mechanistic basis of the microbiota-gut-brain axis.Significance statementThe social environment has pervasive, multifaceted effects on individual health and fitness. If a host’s microbiome is sensitive to the social environment then it could be an important mediator of social effects, as the reciprocal relationships between hosts and their microbiomes have substantial implications for host health. Using a Drosophila melanogaster fruit fly model we show that the fly microbiome is sensitive to the social environment in a sex, age and life-stage dependent manner. In particular, older adult male microbiome communities are altered by same-sex social contact, but this depends on the age of the social partners. These changes have functional effects on fly immunity and lifespan, evidence that indeed this is an influential mediator of social effects on health.

scholarly journals Individual behavioural traits not social context affects learning about novel objects in archerfish

2021 ◽  
Vol 75 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nick A. R. Jones ◽  
Helen C. Spence-Jones ◽  
Mike Webster ◽  
Luke Rendell
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Social Environment ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Behavioural Phenotype ◽  
Social Species ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Animals ◽  
Novel Objects ◽  
The Individual

Abstract Learning can enable rapid behavioural responses to changing conditions but can depend on the social context and behavioural phenotype of the individual. Learning rates have been linked to consistent individual differences in behavioural traits, especially in situations which require engaging with novelty, but the social environment can also play an important role. The presence of others can modulate the effects of individual behavioural traits and afford access to social information that can reduce the need for ‘risky’ asocial learning. Most studies of social effects on learning are focused on more social species; however, such factors can be important even for less-social animals, including non-grouping or facultatively social species which may still derive benefit from social conditions. Using archerfish, Toxotes chatareus, which exhibit high levels of intra-specific competition and do not show a strong preference for grouping, we explored the effect of social contexts on learning. Individually housed fish were assayed in an ‘open-field’ test and then trained to criterion in a task where fish learnt to shoot a novel cue for a food reward—with a conspecific neighbour visible either during training, outside of training or never (full, partial or no visible presence). Time to learn to shoot the novel cue differed across individuals but not across social context. This suggests that social context does not have a strong effect on learning in this non-obligatory social species; instead, it further highlights the importance that inter-individual variation in behavioural traits can have on learning. Significance statement Some individuals learn faster than others. Many factors can affect an animal’s learning rate—for example, its behavioural phenotype may make it more or less likely to engage with novel objects. The social environment can play a big role too—affecting learning directly and modifying the effects of an individual’s traits. Effects of social context on learning mostly come from highly social species, but recent research has focused on less-social animals. Archerfish display high intra-specific competition, and our study suggests that social context has no strong effect on their learning to shoot novel objects for rewards. Our results may have some relevance for social enrichment and welfare of this increasingly studied species, suggesting there are no negative effects of short- to medium-term isolation of this species—at least with regards to behavioural performance and learning tasks.

Two Social Environments in a Working Day: Occupation and Spatial Segregation in Metropolitan Tel Aviv

10.1068/a3452 ◽  
2001 ◽  
Vol 33 (10) ◽  
pp. 1765-1784 ◽  
Author(s):  
Orna Blumen ◽  
Iris Zamir
Keyword(s):  
Social Environment ◽  
Spatial Segregation ◽  
Social Environments ◽  
Social Significance ◽  
Tel Aviv ◽  
Blue Collar Workers ◽  
The Social ◽  
White Collar Workers ◽  
Working Day ◽  
And Gender

The concepts of segregation and social distance have long been used to explain the social environment of stratified residential space. However, the social significance of occupation, though acknowledged, has rarely been applied spatially. In this study, we employed these three concepts to examine the social environment of the entire metropolitan employment space as defined by job location. Smallest space analysis was used to identify and compare the sociospatial segregation produced by workers' occupational distribution in employment and residential spheres. This empirical study focused on metropolitan Tel Aviv, Israel's largest urban area, using the latest available national census. Our findings show that the social milieu of employment differed from that of residence: blue-collar workers were segregated from white-collar workers; managers, clerks, and salespersons formed the core group; and gender and ethnic divisions characterised the sociospatial realm of employment. Overall, most employees changed their social environment when they went to work. The study indicates that spatial segregation, within each sphere and between the two spheres, is intrinsic to the capitalist – patriarchal order.

scholarly journals Challenging ‘ableism’ and teaching about disability in a social work classroom

2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Micheal Shier ◽  
Carole Sinclair ◽  
Lila Gault
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Social Context ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Social Workers ◽  
Social Environment ◽  
Training Module ◽  
Direct Practice ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Work Programs ◽  
Work Education

Social work programs in Canada teach emerging generalist practitioners about the consequences of oppression in the lives of the clients they work with. More emphasis within social work education could be placed on practical ways of contextualizing forms of oppression as each relates specifically to practice. The following provides a description of the oppression of ‘ableism’, and offers an applied training module to help prepare generalist social workers (i.e. current students or direct practitioners) to work with issues of disability as they emerge in their direct practice with clients. The training module helps to facilitate learning specific to the leading theoretical discussions and the social context of disability within society. Through these discussions students might then become more aware of their role as practitioners in challenging the oppression of ‘ableism’, rather than maintain outdated modes of service delivery and intervention with those people disabled by the social environment.

scholarly journals Relatedness-Supportive Learning Environment for Girls in Physical Education

2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-150 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra L. Gibbons
Keyword(s):  
High School ◽  
Social Context ◽  
Physical Education ◽  
Learning Environment ◽  
Social Environments ◽  
Alternative Strategies ◽  
Healthy Relationships ◽  
The Social ◽  
High School Physical Education ◽  
Supportive Learning Environment

The challenges and issues associated with girls’ disengagement from high school physical education are serious and long standing. This disengagement has provided the impetus for the examination of alternative strategies to facilitate girls’ engagement in physical education. The purpose of this paper is to share a range of gender-inclusive practices in physical education grounded in the concept of a relatedness-supportive learning environment. "Relatedness" is the feeling of being connected to others in a social context. In turn, "relatedness support" refers to the social environments in which individuals have the opportunity to develop healthy relationships with others.

The social environment compresses the diversity of genetic aberrations into the uniformity of schizophrenia manifestations

2006 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 406-408 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ralf-Peter Behrendt
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Social Environment ◽  
Genetic Aberrations ◽  
The Social ◽  
Active Contribution

Genetically and neurodevelopmentally, there may be a thousand schizophrenias, yet there would be no schizophrenia at all without active contribution from all of us; none – outside the primitive processes that regulate our relationship with one another. In order to understand the nature of schizophrenia as it unfolds relatively uniformly in the social context, we need to depart from an evolutionarily more feasible understanding of society.

Individuality and habits in institutional economics

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (5) ◽  
pp. 791-809
Author(s):  
Heath Spong
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Social Environment ◽  
Institutional Economics ◽  
Individual Development ◽  
Self Concept ◽  
Structure Framework ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Over Time

AbstractIn this paper a sophisticated conception of individuality is developed that extends beyond simple heterogeneity and is consistent with the approach of institutional economics. Studies of human biological and psychological development are used to illustrate the foundations of human individuality and the impact of the social environment on individual development. The link between the social environment and ongoing agential properties is established through the role of habits, which provide some continuity to individual personalities over time and assist them in navigating the social context they inhabit. Reflexivity is established via an agency-structure framework that endows individuals a changeable self-concept and an ability to interpret their relationship to the social context. The coordination of different individuals is explained not simply through reference to institutional structure, but also through the agent-level properties of shared habits. While reducing differences between individuals to one of degrees, shared habits are shown to be particularly important in the context of agent-sensitive institutions. Finally, the potential for different institutional experiences to impact the reflexivity of individuals is explored.

scholarly journals Reconsidering Relational Autonomy. Personal Autonomy for Socially Embedded and Temporally Extended Selves

2008 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Holger Baumann
Keyword(s):  
Social Environment ◽  
Personal Autonomy ◽  
Social Conditions ◽  
Social Dimension ◽  
Personal Relationships ◽  
Causal Role ◽  
Relational Autonomy ◽  
Social Environments ◽  
The Social ◽  
Over Time

AbstractMost recent accounts of personal autonomy acknowledge that the social environment a person lives in, and the personal relationships she entertains, have some impact on her autonomy. Two kinds of conceptualizing social conditions are traditionally distinguished in this regard: Causally relational accounts hold that certain relationships and social environments play a causal role for the development and on-going exercise of autonomy. Constitutively relational accounts, by contrast, claim that autonomy is at least partly constituted by a person’s social environment or standing. The central aim of this paper is to raise the question how causally and constitutively relational approaches relate to the fact that we exercise our autonomy over time. I argue that once the temporal scope of autonomy is opened up, we need not only to think differently about the social dimension of autonomy. We also need to reconsider the very distinction between causally and constitutively relational accounts, because it is itself a synchronic (and not a diachronic) distinction.

scholarly journals Early and adult social environments have independent effects on individual fitness in a social vertebrate

2015 ◽  
Vol 282 (1813) ◽  
pp. 20151167 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vérane Berger ◽  
Jean-François Lemaître ◽  
Dominique Allainé ◽  
Jean-Michel Gaillard ◽  
Aurélie Cohas
Keyword(s):  
Social Environment ◽  
Lifetime Reproductive Success ◽  
Social Environments ◽  
Long Term Effects ◽  
Delayed Effects ◽  
Individual Fitness ◽  
Fitness Consequences ◽  
Dominant Female ◽  
The Social ◽  
Independent Effects

Evidence that the social environment at critical stages of life-history shapes individual trajectories is accumulating. Previous studies have identified either current or delayed effects of social environments on fitness components, but no study has yet analysed fitness consequences of social environments at different life stages simultaneously. To fill the gap, we use an extensive dataset collected during a 24-year intensive monitoring of a population of Alpine marmots ( Marmota marmota ), a long-lived social rodent. We test whether the number of helpers in early life and over the dominance tenure length has an impact on litter size at weaning, juvenile survival, longevity and lifetime reproductive success (LRS) of dominant females. Dominant females, who were born into a group containing many helpers and experiencing a high number of accumulated helpers over dominance tenure length showed an increased LRS through an increased longevity. We provide evidence that in a wild vertebrate, both early and adult social environments influence individual fitness, acting additionally and independently. These findings demonstrate that helpers have both short- and long-term effects on dominant female Alpine marmots and that the social environment at the time of birth can play a key role in shaping individual fitness in social vertebrates.

scholarly journals Understanding Critical Information Literacy through Social Epistemology

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Martin I. Nord
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Critical Theory ◽  
Social Environment ◽  
Information Literacy ◽  
Social Epistemology ◽  
Epistemological Foundation ◽  
Theoretical Approaches ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
New Models

Critical theoretical approaches to information literacy are an important part of the growing LIS focus on the context of information. This concern for information’s social environment and the awareness of new models of interaction between learners and librarians open the possibility for using social epistemology to better understand information literacy. The concept of social epistemology—the study of the ways in which an individual’s knowledge is shaped by their interactions with the world around them—has long been part of epistemology. However, LIS theorists Margaret Egan and Jesse Shera, who coined the term, intended it to address librarianship specifically. This paper argues that social epistemology is well positioned to strengthen the critical practice of information literacy, based both on the social epistemological characteristics of critical theory and the information literacy aspects of the social epistemology stream in the field of philosophy. A review of the critical theoretical trend in LIS literature on information literacy reveals an already-present social epistemological foundation on which LIS research can build to expand the application of critical theory to information literacy. Placing this literature in conversation with itself illuminates the ways in which engagement with social epistemological concerns is already evolving. This paper then critiques the literature and highlights some concerns. Recognition of these weaknesses in otherwise valuable work alerts us to opportunities for improvement. This paper suggests that future progress will be tied to better understanding of the social context of knowledge.

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