Communication breakdown! Como a perda de informação afeta o resultado de interações comportamentais em Sporophila maximiliani

Abstract

Communication is part of several social interactions of animals and the transmission of information and decoding by the receiver depend on the quality of the emitted signal, which can be acoustic, visual and/or chemical. The degradation of these signals can generate loss of information and cause damage to the animals' vital processes. Considering that anxiety prepares the individual for unpredictable situations, the loss of information has the potential to cause stress and motivational conflict in organisms, resulting in altered behavior, as has already been demonstrated for anuran species. In this project, we seek to understand, through a systematic review, trends, advances and gaps in experimental studies on animal communication, with a focus on studies that investigate the effect of signal quality changes on communication and interactions. We also aimed to understand whether the loss of information alters behavioral interactions in birds, using the species Sporophila maximiliani as a model. For this, we performed two experiments: i) a playback experiment, to simulate the acoustic signal and ii) a mirror model, to simulate the visual signal. We identified that the number of publications on animal communication with an experimental approach, which investigate social interactions and/or behavioral changes, has been increasing since the 90s. However, the impact of these studies on the scientific community does not follow this growth, with few publications receiving greater attention. emphasis. We also note that the number of studies using endangered species is still low, showing a lack of studies with more vulnerable animals. There are also few experimental studies with signal quality in relation to the total number of publications in animal communication, despite the results of studies that address changes in the signal showing that damage to the signal has an impact on individuals and the interactions they carry out. In our experiments, we also identified that the behavior of Sporophila maximiliani is affected by the loss of information during communication, generating stress and fear in the individuals. However, this effect was dependent on the signal modality, so that for visual signals the loss of information does not cause this effect. Thus, changes in signals in communication had a direct effect on individuals and it is extremely important to promote studies that seek to understand how each group of organisms responds to these changes.