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Publication Open Access Aggression and multi-modal signaling in noise in a common urban songbird(Springer, 2022) Department of Media and Visual Arts; Department of Psychology; Akçay, Çağlar; Yelimlieş, Alper; Önsal, Çağla; Faculty Member; Department of Media and Visual Arts; Department of Psychology; College of Social Sciences and Humanities; 272053; N/A; N/AAnthropogenic noise may disrupt signals used to mediate aggressive interactions, leading to more physical aggression between opponents. One solution to this problem is to switch signaling effort to a less noisy modality (e.g., the visual modality). In the present study, we investigate aggressive behaviors and signaling in urban and rural male European robins (Erithacus rubecula) in response to simulated intrusions with or without experimental noise. First, we predicted that urban birds, living in noisier habitats, would be generally more aggressive than rural birds. We also predicted that during simulated intrusions with experimental noise, robins would increase their physical aggression and show a multi-modal shift, i.e., respond with more visual threat displays and sing fewer songs. Finally, we expected the multi-modal shift in response to noise to be stronger in urban birds compared to rural birds. The results showed that urban birds were more aggressive than rural robins, but an increase in aggression with experimental noise was seen only in the rural birds. Urban but not rural birds decreased their song rate in response to noise. Contrary to the multi-modal shift hypothesis, however, there was no evidence of a concurrent increase in visual signals. These results point to a complex role of immediate plasticity and longer-term processes in affecting communication during aggressive interactions under anthropogenic noise. Significance statement Human activity has an enormous effect on wildlife, including on their social behavior. Animals living in urban areas often tend to be more aggressive than those living in rural areas, which may be due to urban acoustic noise making communication between individuals more difficult. In a study with a common songbird, the European robin, we investigated the role of urban acoustic noise in aggression and territorial communication. Urban robins were more aggressive than rural robins, and additional noise in the territory increased aggression in rural but not urban robins. While urban robins decreased their singing effort with additional noise, they did not increase visual signals concurrently. These results suggest that noise can indeed make animals behave more aggressively although the effect may depend on how noisy it is already. These results further our understanding of how human-made noise changes animal communication and social behavior.
Publication Metadata only Are signals of aggressive intent less honest in urban habitats?(Oxford Univ Press Inc, 2020) Beck, Michelle L.; Sewall, Kendra B.; Department of Psychology; Akçay, Çağlar; Faculty Member; Department of Psychology; College of Social Sciences and Humanities; 272053How anthropogenic change affects animal social behavior, including communication is an important question. Urban noise often drives shifts in acoustic properties of signals but the consequences of noise for the honesty of signals-that is, how well they predict signaler behavior-is unclear. Here we examine whether honesty of aggressive signaling is compromised in male urban song sparrows (Melospiza melodia). Song sparrows have two honest close-range signals: the low amplitude soft songs (an acoustic signal) and wing waves (a visual signal), but whether the honesty of these signals is affected by urbanization has not been examined. If soft songs are less effective in urban noise, we predict that they should predict attacks less reliably in urban habitats compared to rural habitats. We confirmed earlier findings that urban birds were more aggressive than rural birds and found that acoustic noise was higher in urban habitats. Urban birds still sang more soft songs than rural birds. High rates of soft songs and low rates of loud songs predicted attacks in both habitats. Thus, while urbanization has a significant effect on aggressive behaviors, it might have a limited effect on the overall honesty of aggressive signals in song sparrows. We also found evidence for a multimodal shift: urban birds tended to give proportionally more wing waves than soft songs than rural birds, although whether that shift is due to noise-dependent plasticity is unclear. These findings encourage further experimental study of the specific variables that are responsible for behavioral change due to urbanization.Publication Metadata only Exploration behavior differs between Darwin's finch species and predicts territory defense and hatching success(Springer, 2024) Katsis, Andrew C.; Colombelli-Negrel, Diane; Common, Lauren K.; Garcia-Loor, Jefferson; Kleindorfer, Sonia; Department of Psychology; Akçay, Çağlar; Department of Psychology; College of Social Sciences and HumanitiesDarwin's finch species in the Galapagos Islands are famously distinguished by their morphology but less attention has been given to behavioral differences between species. In this study, we compared behavior between four Darwin's finch species on Floreana Island: small ground finch (Geospiza fuliginosa), medium ground finch (G. fortis), small tree finch (Camarhynchus parvulus), and medium tree finch (C. pauper). After capturing birds using mist-nets, we measured three behavioral traits: (1) boldness during human handling, (2) exploration in a novel environment, and (3) aggressiveness towards their mirror image. First, we found that ground finches were bolder and more exploratory than tree finches, consistent with their distinct ecological niches on Floreana Island and with the theoretical prediction that diet generalists should be less wary of novelty. Second, we tested the ecological validity of these behavioral variables at the individual level by relating them to territory defense behavior and breeding success. We found that males that were more exploratory in the novel environment also reacted more aggressively to a simulated territory intruder and showed lower offspring hatching success during the breeding season. Hence, our findings support previous work showing behavioral differences between Darwin's finch species and also suggest pathways by which behavioral differences among individuals might influence fitness. Significance statement Closely-related species that overlap in their geographical range may differ in their morphology and/or behavior, allowing them to occupy different ecological niches. In this study, we explored behavioral differences between four Darwin's finch species on Floreana Island in the Galapagos Archipelago. We found clear interspecies differences in behavior, with the ground finches struggling more often during handling (boldness) and visiting more sectors in a novel environment (exploration) compared to the tree finches. After birds were released, we continued to observe a subset of male finches in the wild. An individual's exploration behavior significantly predicted both its aggressive response to a territory intruder (simulated using song playback) and offspring hatching success during the breeding season. This suggests that individual differences in exploration behavior can potentially be used as a proxy for territorial behavior in the wild and may also predict fitness outcomes.Publication Metadata only Male parental investment reflects the level of partner contributions and brood value in tree swallows(Springer, 2018) Lendvai, Adam Z.; Stanback, Mark; Haussmann, Mark F.; Moore, Ignacio T.; Bonier, Frances; Department of Psychology; Akçay, Çağlar; Faculty Member; Department of Psychology; College of Social Sciences and Humanities; 272053Biparental care presents an interesting case of cooperation and conflict between unrelated individuals. Several models have been proposed to explain how parents should respond to changes in each other's parental care to maximize their own fitness, predicting no change, partial compensation, or matching effort as a response. Here, we present an experiment in tree swallows (Tachycineta bicolor) in which we increased the offspring provisioning of females by presenting them, but not their mates, with additional nestling begging calls using automated playbacks. We performed this experiment in two populations differing in future breeding opportunities. We found that in response to a temporary increase in female parental effort, males in the northern population (with lower future breeding opportunities and thus higher brood value) matched the increased effort, whereas males in the southern population did not. We also found that increases in parental care during playbacks were driven by the females (i.e., females initiated the increased effort and their mates followed them) in the northern population but not the southern population. These results support the idea that with incomplete information about the brood value and need, cues or signals from the partner might become important in coordinating parental care.Significance statementMale tree swallows increase parental effort when their mates need to work harder. Using an automated system, we broadcast playback of hungry nestling calls only when the female parent was visiting the nest. In a population where the value of the current brood was high, males significantly increased their provisioning rate, much more than their partners did. Since only the females could hear the playbacks, and the begging of the nestlings did not change in response to the treatment, we suggest that either the males used their partner's feeding rate as a cue or the females may have communicated to their mates that they should work harder. These results suggest that cues or signals from the partner may be important in coordinating parental care.Publication Open Access Moral intuitions predict pro-social behaviour in a climate commons game(Elsevier, 2021) Akyazı, Pınar Ertör; Department of Psychology; Akçay, Çağlar; Faculty Member; Department of Psychology; College of Social Sciences and Humanities; 272053The climate crisis and appeals to tackle it are often framed in moral terms, but few studies tested whether individual variation in moral intuitions correlate with pro-environmental behaviours that may affect the climate commons. In the present study we ask whether moral intuitions regarding harm (care and compassion), fairness, in-group loyalty, stance towards authority, and purity, as quantified by the Moral Foundations Theory, correlate with pro-environmental behaviours. Participants played 10 rounds of a public goods game framed as extraction of a mineral that affects climate commons negatively. We found that participants' extraction in the first round of the game was positively related to loyalty and authority moral foundations. Average extraction over all ten rounds of the game was negatively related to harm and positively related to loyalty moral foundations with small to moderate effect sizes. The fairness dimension was only weakly related to extraction in the first round and not related to average extraction over the entire game. Purity dimension did not relate to extraction neither in the first round nor on average. These results suggest that intrinsic factors such as moral intuitions are likely to play an important role in fostering pro-environmental behaviours to address the climate crisis.Publication Open Access Multi-modal communication: song sparrows increase signal redundancy in noise(The Royal Society, 2019) Beecher, Michael D.; Department of Psychology; Akçay, Çağlar; Faculty Member; Department of Psychology; College of Social Sciences and Humanities; 272053Although the effects of anthropogenic noise on animal communication have been studied widely, most research on the effect of noise in communication has focused on signals in a single modality. Consequently, how multi-modal communication is affected by anthropogenic noise is relatively poorly understood. Here, we ask whether song sparrows (Melospiza melodia) show evidence of plasticity in response to noise in two aggressive signals in acoustic and visual modalities. We test two hypotheses: (i) that song sparrows will shift signalling effort to the visual modality (the multi-modal shift hypothesis) and (ii) that they will increase redundancy of their multi-modal signalling (the back-up signal hypothesis). We presented male song sparrows with song playback and a taxidermic mount with or without a low-frequency acoustic noise from a nearby speaker. We found that males did not switch their signalling effort to visual modality (i.e. wing waves) in response to the noise. However, the correlation between warbled soft songs and wing waves increased in the noise treatment, i.e. signals became more redundant. These results suggest that when faced with anthropogenic noise, song sparrows can increase the redundancy of their multi-modal signals, which may aid in the robustness of the communication system.Publication Open Access Song overlapping, noise, and territorial aggression in great tits(Oxford University Press (OUP), 2020) Avşar, Alican; Bilgin, C. Can; Department of Psychology; Akçay, Çağlar; Porsuk, Yasin Kağan; Çabuk, Dilan; Faculty Member; Teaching Faculty; Department of Psychology; College of Social Sciences and Humanities; Graduate School of Social Sciences and Humanities; 272053; N/A; N/ACommunication often happens in noisy environments where interference from the ambient noise and other signalers may reduce the effectiveness of signals which may lead to more conflict between interacting individuals. Signalers may also evolve behaviors to interfere with signals of opponents, for example, by temporally overlapping them with their own, such as the song overlapping behavior that is seen in some songbirds during aggressive interactions. Song overlapping has been proposed to be a signal of aggressive intent, but few studies directly examined the association between song overlapping and aggressive behaviors of the sender. In the present paper, we examined whether song overlapping and ambient noise are associated positively with aggressive behaviors. We carried out simulated territorial intrusions in a population of great tits (Pares major) living in an urban-rural gradient to assess signaling and aggressive behaviors. Song overlapping was associated negatively with aggressive behaviors males displayed against a simulated intruder. This result is inconsistent with the hypothesis that song overlapping is an aggressive signal in this species. Ambient noise levels were associated positively with aggressive behaviors but did not correlate with song rate, song duration, or song overlapping. Great tits in noisy urban habitats may display higher levels of aggressive behaviors due to either interference of noise in aggressive communication or another indirect effect of noise.Publication Open Access The role of coping strategies in post-traumatic growth among Syrian refugees: a structural equation model(Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI), 2021) Acar, İbrahim H.; Alhiraki, Omar A.; Fahham, Ola; Erim, Yeşim; Department of Psychology; Acartürk, Ceren; Acar, Büşra; Faculty Member; Department of Psychology; College of Social Sciences and Humanities; Graduate School of Social Sciences and Humanities; 39271; N/AThe Syrian conflict has led to a mass migration of Syrians to other countries and exposed them to many possible traumatic events and stressors in their country of origin and in the resettlement process. The possibility of positive psychological effects of adverse life events is less documented among Syrian refugees. Thus, the current study aimed to develop preliminary evidence for the identifying factors: traumatic experiences, post-migration stressors and coping strategies that are associated with post-traumatic growth (PTG) of Syrian refugees residing in Turkey. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used in the current study to assess the associations among these factors. Data were obtained from Syrian refugees residing in the governorates of Hatay and Mardin. A total of 528 Syrians, aged between 18–77 years (M = 35.60, SD = 11.65) participated in this cross-sectional study. Results from the SEM indicated that past traumatic experiences and post-migration stressors were indirectly related to PTG. The results from the current study provide support for that the association between refugees’ traumatic experiences, post-migration stressors and PTG appear to be explained through the presence of coping strategies which could be addressed in the psychotherapies and psychosocial interventions for refugees to promote positive psychological change. Future studies should address the effects of post-migration stressors on PTG in detail.