Individual personalities predict social behaviour in wild networks of great tits (Parus major)

Social environments have an important effect on a range of ecological processes, and form a crucial component of selection. However, little is known of the link between personality, social behaviour and population structure. We combine a well‐understood personality trait with large‐scale social netw...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Ecology letters 2013-11, Vol.16 (11), p.1365-1372
Main Authors: Aplin, L. M, Farine, D. R, Morand‐Ferron, J, Cole, E. F, Cockburn, A, Sheldon, B. C, Sih, Andrew
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animal and plant ecology
Animal behavior
Animal, plant and microbial ecology
Animals
Animals, Wild
Aves
Behavior, Animal
Behavioural syndrome
Biological and medical sciences
Birds
Female
flocks
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
General aspects
Male
males
Models, Theoretical
Paridae
Parus major
Passeriformes - physiology
Personality
Social Behavior
social behaviour
social environment
social network theory
social networks
songbirds
Time Factors
Vertebrates: general zoology, morphology, phylogeny, systematics, cytogenetics, geographical distribution
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Summary:Social environments have an important effect on a range of ecological processes, and form a crucial component of selection. However, little is known of the link between personality, social behaviour and population structure. We combine a well‐understood personality trait with large‐scale social networks in wild songbirds, and show that personality underpins multiple aspects of social organisation. First, we demonstrate a relationship between network centrality and personality with ‘proactive’ (fast‐exploring) individuals associating weakly with greater numbers of conspecifics and moving between flocks. Second, temporal stability of associations relates to personality: ‘reactive’ (slow‐exploring) birds form synergistically stable relationships. Finally, we show that personality influences social structure, with males non‐randomly distributed across groups. These results provide strong evidence that songbirds follow alternative social strategies related to personality. This has implications not only for the causes of social network structure but also for the strength and direction of selection on personality in natural populations.
ISSN:1461-023X
1461-0248
DOI:10.1111/ele.12181