Dataset for paper titled: Conceptual preferences can be transmitted via selective social information use between competing wild bird species ...

• Main Authors: Loukola, Olli, Kivelä, Sami, Tolvanen, Jere, Forsman, Jukka
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: Dryad 2022
• Subjects: FOS Biological sciences; Concept learning; social learning; Interspecific social information use; great tit; pied flycatcher; Parus; Northern Finland
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.9s4mw6mjs; https://datadryad.org/stash/dataset/doi:10.5061/dryad.9s4mw6mjs

Concept learning is considered a high-level adaptive ability. Thus far, it has been studied in laboratory via asocial trial and error learning. Yet, social information use is common among animals but it remains unknown whether concept learning by observing others occurs. We tested whether pied flycatchers (Ficedula hypoleuca) form conceptual relationships from the apparent choices of nest-site characteristics (geometric symbol attached to the nest box) of great tits (Parus major). Each wild flycatcher female (n = 124) observed one tit pair that exhibited an apparent preference for either a large or a small symbol and was then allowed to choose between two nest boxes with a large and a small symbol, but the symbol shape was different to that on the tit nest. Older flycatcher females were more likely to copy the symbol size preference of tits than yearling flycatcher females when there was a high number of visible eggs or a few partially visible eggs in the tit nest. However, this depended on the phenotype; ... : Setup of the experiment The experiment was conducted in mixed and coniferous forests near the city of Oulu, in northern Finland, between 2012-2014. Nest boxes were situated along small roads and great tits were allowed to settle and breed freely. The basic sampling unit in the study was a set of two pairs of closely situated nest boxes inhabited by a pair of great tits and a pair of pied flycatchers. Prior to the arrival of flycatchers, we randomized one of the symbol shape (triangle/circle) – symbol size (large/small) associations and attached a white plastic symbol around the entrance hole of an active great tit nest. An empty nest box was then erected near (3-6 m) the great tit’s nest box on a tree of the same species, at the same height and facing same direction as the occupied box, and the same symbol shape but opposite symbol size compared to that on the tit nest box was attached on the empty box. Two empty boxes, entrance holes facing towards the tit box pair, were erected 20-25 m from the great tit’s ...