Synonyms
Definition
Signals are an important aspect of social behavior in the biological world, as they allow information and/or influence to be transmitted between organisms via intermediary signalling and response behaviors. This is often interpreted through an evolutionary lens, whereby the relevant behaviors are assumed to have co-evolved; however, alternative definitions and formalizations exist in the literature.
Introduction
The evolutionary science of animal signalling began with Charles Darwin’s The Expressions of the Emotions in Man and Animals, published in 1872, and signalling has been central to the study of animal behavior (ethology) since then. In 1973, the Nobel Prize in Medicine was jointly awarded to three ethologists whose work was pioneering in this regard: Karl von Frisch, Konrad Lorenz, and Niko Tinbergen. This included work on the phenomena of imprinting by hatchling birds, and von Frisch’s description of the complex,...
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References
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Acknowledgments
This publication was made possible through the support of a grant from the John Templeton Foundation (Grant ID 60811). The views expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the John Templeton Foundation.
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Brusse, C. (2020). Animal Signalling. In: Shackelford, T., Weekes-Shackelford, V. (eds) Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_2146-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_2146-1
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