Selective Attention in Call Overlap Avoidance in Green Treefrogs
Mentor 1
Gerlinde Hoebel
Location
Union Wisconsin Room
Start Date
29-4-2016 1:30 PM
End Date
29-4-2016 3:30 PM
Description
Female treefrogs discriminate against overlapped calls, and males avoid overlapping calls with their neighbors. In natural choruses, so many rivals may call at the same time that males cannot avoid call overlap with all of them. Males may solve this dilemma by selective attention, i.e., by avoiding call overlap with only a subset of rivals. The selective attention hypothesis predicts that that if males are only confronted with one rival, irrespective of his attractiveness, they should avoid call overlap with this rival. However, if confronted with several rivals, males should avoid call overlap with the more attractive rival, but largely disregard the unattractive one. We tested this hypothesis by conducting playback experiments with male green treefrogs, broadcasting either calls of (i) one unattractive rival, those of (ii) one attractive rival, or (iii) a mixed playback of both attractive and unattractive rivals. As predicted by the selective attention hypothesis, males avoided call overlap more strongly with calls of attractive rivals.
Selective Attention in Call Overlap Avoidance in Green Treefrogs
Union Wisconsin Room
Female treefrogs discriminate against overlapped calls, and males avoid overlapping calls with their neighbors. In natural choruses, so many rivals may call at the same time that males cannot avoid call overlap with all of them. Males may solve this dilemma by selective attention, i.e., by avoiding call overlap with only a subset of rivals. The selective attention hypothesis predicts that that if males are only confronted with one rival, irrespective of his attractiveness, they should avoid call overlap with this rival. However, if confronted with several rivals, males should avoid call overlap with the more attractive rival, but largely disregard the unattractive one. We tested this hypothesis by conducting playback experiments with male green treefrogs, broadcasting either calls of (i) one unattractive rival, those of (ii) one attractive rival, or (iii) a mixed playback of both attractive and unattractive rivals. As predicted by the selective attention hypothesis, males avoided call overlap more strongly with calls of attractive rivals.
