1. Digest: Early exposure to facial cues facilitates facial learning in paper wasps*
- Author
-
Matías I. Muñoz
- Subjects
0106 biological sciences ,0301 basic medicine ,Paper wasp ,Communication ,business.industry ,fungi ,Identity (social science) ,macromolecular substances ,Biology ,010603 evolutionary biology ,01 natural sciences ,03 medical and health sciences ,030104 developmental biology ,Polistes metricus ,Genetics ,Developmental plasticity ,Animal communication ,General Agricultural and Biological Sciences ,business ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics - Abstract
Tibbetts et al. evaluated the influence of the rearing environment on the facial learning capacity of the paper wasp Polistes metricus. Wasps reared with cues signaling individual identity learned to discriminate faces more accurately than wasps reared in the absence of facial cues. These findings indicate that developmental plasticity plays a significant role in the evolution of animal communication systems.
- Published
- 2018