Communication is a prerequisite of human society. But when you look, smell and hear around, you rapidly realize that we are not the only ones to communicate. Indeed, plants, fungus, animals and other living things such as bacteria show extraordinary ways to “talk” to each other.

The diversity of animal signals  (e.g. visual, acoustic, chemical) and their evolution has particularly fascinated biologists for decades. Etymologically, the term “communication” implies to share information between a signaler and a receiver, but the interplay between the two remains extremely challenging to study, especially in animals in their natural environment.

The use of robots in ecology is in its infancy, but promises great advances in the study of animal communication. Lizards are not outdone with this robotic revolution (see previous AA posts and several others should be forthcoming!). The use of lizard robots allows researchers to control the signal stimulus directly in the field and to address questions related to species recognition, mate choice and evolution of aggressiveness, for instance.

In a recent paper, Dave Clark and collaborators went further by designing an interactive lizard robot! Yes, the study is about Galapagos lava lizards, but it deserves great attention in the Anole Annals community as understanding the processes underlying lizard communication is of pressing interest in anole research and the interactive robot may help to understand its evolution. The authors presented a bio-mimetic conspecific robot and tested whether an immediate or a postponed 30s response of the robot to the subject’s display influenced the display latency and duration of the focal individual. They found that immediate display response by the robot to a subject’s bobbing display stimulated the focal lizard to display more rapidly and more often than when the robot’s response was delayed. These results suggest that subjects perceived a rapid response from their robotic contestant as being more aggressive than a delayed response.

This study is the first interactive robot playback experiment with lizards in natural conditions and it demonstrates that the response ‘timing of the receiver is a crucial factor of lizard communication.

 

Reference:

Clark, D.L., Macedonia, J.M., Rowe, J.W., Austin, M.R, Centurione, I.M, Valle, C.A. (2019). Galápagos lava lizards (Microlophus bivittatus) respond dynamically to displays from interactive conspecific robots.  Behav Ecol Sociobiol 73: 136. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-019-2732-6

Claire Dufour
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