Receiver Psychology and the Value of Information

接受者心理学和信息的价值

• 批准号: 0727221
• 负责人: Aimee Dunlap
• 金额: $ 42.63万
• 依托单位: University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2007-09-01 至 2012-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0727221&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Receiver; Psychology; Value; Information

Historically, studies of animal signalling have taken one of two approaches. They may take an economic approach focusing on the costs and benefits of signalling, or a psychological approach that considers the role of learning, memory and discrimination in signal processing. This project will develop and test models of signal-use that combine these approaches. To achieve this, the project will focus on a natural phenomenon known as aposematism or warning coloration, in which bright or distinctive coloration seems to advertise that a potential prey animal is distasteful or unprofitable. The proposed studies will use ideas from psychology to measure and manipulate the relative conspicuousness of experimental food items while simultaneously manipulating the costs and benefits of attacking these food items. A key innovation here is that psychological techniques will provide rigorous and objective measures of conspicousness. The models developed here predict that the protection provided by warning coloration depends on 1) conspicousness, 2) the abundance of distasteful or bad prey; 3) the reliablity of the association between coloration and prey quality; and 4) the costs and benefits associated with consuming good and bad food items. Several experiments will use captive animals (blue jays) in highly controlled laboratory situations to explore the effects of these four fundamental variables. It is expected that this combination of models and experimentation will validate and refine a new approach to animal signal use, and this will help investigators frame more precise questions about signalling and signal discrimination. Students of animal signalling often describe signals as ?exaggerated? or ?conspicuous,? but in practice these terms are rather vague and anthropomorphic. This research will show how future investigators can use ideas derived from psychological studies of discrimination to provide objective and measureable definitions for these basic concepts. The proposed research will also have strong broader impacts because it will facilitate the participation of 16 undergraduate students in the research. These students will participate in a ?practicum in experimental behavioral ecology?.Working in groups of four, they will collaborate to implement and publish one of the studies in the proposed research. In addition, they will take part in a year-long seminar course with instruction in underlying scientific concepts, experimental design and scientific writing.

从历史上看，动物信号的研究采用了两种方法之一。 他们可能采用一种经济方法，重点关注信号传导的成本和收益，或者一种心理方法，该方法考虑了学习，记忆和歧视在信号处理中的作用。该项目将开发并测试结合这些方法的信号使用模型。为了实现这一目标，该项目将集中在一种自然现象上，称为授权或警告着色，在这种现象中，明亮或独特的着色似乎会宣传潜在的猎物动物是令人反感或无利可图的。拟议的研究将使用心理学的想法来衡量和操纵实验食品的相对显着性，同时操纵攻击这些食品的成本和收益。这里的一个关键创新是，心理技术将提供严格和客观的倾向度量。此处开发的模型预测，警告颜色提供的保护取决于1）倾斜度，2）丰富的令人讨厌或不良的猎物； 3）着色与猎物质量之间的关联性的依赖性； 4）与食用好食品和坏食品相关的成本和收益。几项实验将在高度控制的实验室情况下使用圈养动物（蓝鸟）来探索这四个基本变量的影响。可以预期，模型和实验的这种组合将验证和完善一种新的动物信号使用方法，这将有助于研究人员对信号传导和信号歧视的更精确的问题。动物信号的学生经常将信号描述为“夸张？或显着但是实际上，这些术语相当模糊和拟人化。这项研究将展示未来的研究人员如何使用歧视心理学研究的思想，为这些基本概念提供客观和可衡量的定义。拟议的研究还将产生更大的影响，因为它将促进16名本科生参与研究。这些学生将参加实验行为生态学的实践？。此外，他们还将参加为期一年的研讨会课程，并提供有关科学概念，实验设计和科学写作的指导。