Cumulative Effects of Foraging Behavior and Social Dominance on Brain Development in a Facultatively Social Bee (Ceratina australensis)

In social insects, both task performance (foraging) and dominance are associated with increased brain investment, particularly in the mushroom bodies. Whether and how these factors interact is unknown. Here we present data on a system where task performance and social behavior can be analyzed simultaneously: the small carpenter bee Ceratina australensis. We show that foraging and dominance have separate and combined cumulative effects on mushroom body calyx investment. Female C. australensis nest solitarily and socially in the same populations at the same time. Social colonies comprise two sisters: the social primary, which monopolizes foraging and reproduction, and the social secondary, which is neither a forager nor reproductive but rather remains at the nest as a guard. We compare the brains of solitary females that forage and reproduce but do not engage in social interactions with those of social individuals while controlling for age, reproductive status, and foraging experience. Mushroom body calyx volume was positively correlated with wing wear, a proxy for foraging experience. We also found that, although total brain volume did not vary among reproductive strategies (solitary vs. social nesters), socially dominant primaries had larger mushroom body calyx volumes (corrected for both brain and body size variation) than solitary females; socially subordinate secondaries (that are neither dominant nor foragers) had the least-developed mushroom body calyces. These data demonstrate that sociality itself does not explain mushroom body volume; however, achieving and maintaining dominance status in a group was associated with mushroom body calyx enlargement. Dominance and foraging effects were cumulative; dominant social primary foragers had larger mushroom body volumes than solitary foragers, and solitary foragers had larger mushroom body volumes than nonforaging social secondary guards. This is the first evidence for cumulative effects on brain development by dominance and task performance.

Download Full-text

The Loss of Sociality Is Accompanied by Reduced Neural Investment in Mushroom Body Volume in the Sweat Bee Augochlora Pura (Hymenoptera: Halictidae)

Annals of the Entomological Society of America ◽

10.1093/aesa/saaa019 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Sarah Pahlke ◽

Marc A Seid ◽

Sarah Jaumann ◽

Adam Smith

Keyword(s):

Social Behavior ◽

Social Interactions ◽

Distributed Cognition ◽

Mushroom Body ◽

Brain Area ◽

Brain Evolution ◽

Body Volume ◽

Social Brain ◽

The Social ◽

Mosaic Brain Evolution

Abstract Social behavior has been predicted to select for increased neural investment (the social brain hypothesis) and also to select for decreased neural investment (the distributed cognition hypothesis). Here, we use two related bees, the social Augochlorella aurata (Smith) (Hymenoptera: Halictidae) and the related Augochlora pura (Say), which has lost social behavior, to test the contrasting predictions of these two hypotheses in these taxa. We measured the volumes of the mushroom body (MB) calyces, a brain area shown to be important for cognition in previous studies, as well as the optic lobes and antennal lobes. We compared females at the nest foundress stage when both species are solitary so that brain development would not be influenced by social interactions. We show that the loss of sociality was accompanied by a loss in relative neural investment in the MB calyces. This is consistent with the predictions of the social brain hypothesis. Ovary size did not correlate with MB calyx volume. This is the first study to demonstrate changes in mosaic brain evolution in response to the loss of sociality.

Download Full-text

Cumulative Effects of Adding a Small Group Intervention to Social Network Testing on HIV Testing Rates Among Crack Users in San Salvador, El Salvador

AIDS and Behavior ◽

10.1007/s10461-021-03160-9 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Julia Dickson-Gomez ◽

Sergey Tarima ◽

Laura Glasman ◽

Wendy Cuellar ◽

Lorena Rivas de Mendoza ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Social Network ◽

El Salvador ◽

Hiv Testing ◽

Small Group ◽

Group Intervention ◽

Cumulative Effects ◽

Group Interventions ◽

San Salvador ◽

The Social ◽

Crack Users

AbstractThe present study evaluates a combination prevention intervention for crack users in San Salvador, El Salvador that included social network HIV testing, community events and small group interventions. We examined the cumulative effects of the social network HIV testing and small group interventions on rates of HIV testing, beyond the increase that we saw with the introduction of the social network HIV testing intervention alone. HIV test data was converted into the number of daily tests and analyzed the immediate and overtime impact of small group interventions during and in the twelve weeks after the small group intervention. The addition of the small group interventions to the baseline of monthly HIV tests resulted in increased rates of testing lasting 7 days after the small group interventions suggesting a reinforcing effect of small group interventions on testing rates.

Download Full-text

Faculty Opinions recommendation of Identification of mushroom body miniature, a zinc-finger protein implicated in brain development of Drosophila.

Faculty Opinions – Post-Publication Peer Review of the Biomedical Literature ◽

10.3410/f.1022517.257610 ◽

2004 ◽

Author(s):

Martin Giurfa

Keyword(s):

Brain Development ◽

Zinc Finger ◽

Mushroom Body ◽

Zinc Finger Protein ◽

Finger Protein

Download Full-text

The influencing outcomes of job engagement: an interpretation from the social exchange theory

International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management ◽

10.1108/ijppm-03-2017-0054 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 67 (5) ◽

pp. 873-889 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Nan Yin

Keyword(s):

Task Performance ◽

Social Exchange ◽

Organizational Citizenship ◽

Organizational Citizenship Behavior ◽

Social Exchange Theory ◽

Exchange Theory ◽

Citizenship Behavior ◽

Job Engagement ◽

Content Type ◽

The Social

Purpose Job engagement is a positive, fulfilling, work-related state of an individual, the perfect link between individual characteristics, job factors and job performance and the important path of an organization creating competitive advantages. Based on the viewpoint of the social exchange theory, the study assumes that employees will generate different influencing outcomes, which are, in order, task performance, organizational citizenship behavior, job burnout and counter-productive work behavior (CWB), according to the degree to which they psychologically expect that job engagement could receive organizational rewards, and discusses the relationships between job engagement and task performance, organizational citizenship behavior and other variables. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from the employees working as the salesmen from 48 computer and computer parts sales companies. The questionnaires of the study were the paired questionnaires. In total, 150 supervisor questionnaires and 633 employee questionnaires have been distributed. Under every sales head, there were some employees. In total, 501 valid paired questionnaires were collected. AMOS 23.0 was employed to process the data in the structural equation modeling and the causal relationships among all the factors were explored. Findings The results revealed that employee job engagement had positive influence on task performance and organizational citizenship behavior and had negative influence on job burnout and counter-productive work behavior; among all the moderating variables, organizational justice just significantly and negatively moderates job engagement and CWB. Originality/value Job engagement is an actively and fully absorbing state of an individual in the work, the perfect link among individual characteristics, job factors and job engagement and the important path of an organization creating competitive advantages. Most of the past studies have explored the positive effects of job engagement. This study tries to explore the positive and negative effects of employee’s job engagement based on the social exchange theory.

Download Full-text

Neural Foundations of Variability in Attachment

The Cultural Nature of Attachment ◽

10.7551/mitpress/9780262036900.003.0010 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Allyson J. Bennett ◽

William D. Hopkins ◽

Ruth Feldman ◽

Valeria Gazzola ◽

Jay Giedd ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Brain Development ◽

Animal Studies ◽

Experimental Studies ◽

Theory Development ◽

Single Type ◽

Negative Consequences ◽

Cultural Contexts ◽

The Social ◽

Insight Into

Neuroscience offers insight into processes that support the development of the social brain within the cultural contexts that permit attachment relationships to form. Both human and nonhuman animal studies are critical to inform theory development and hypothesis testing via descriptive and experimental studies. A scientifically valid evolutionary theory is necessary to account for the remarkable diversity of parenting systems across human and many nonhuman animals. This chapter examines the neural foundations of attachment and poses critical questions that relate to the initiation of this relationship: How does attachment interface with brain development? What is the interplay between attachment and brain development (including elements of bidirectionality)? Are there negative consequences associated with variation in attachment, and are they reversible? Rather than conceptualizing attachment in terms of a single type of relationship, or a rigid developmental channel, this chapter proposes that an expanded consideration of variation is necessary to understand the neural foundations of infant-caregiver relationships, and the role of those relationships in developing competence across the life span. This approach will permit identification of common neurobiological elements of attachment as well as the remarkable plasticity and diversity within and across individuals, cultures, and species.

Download Full-text