Categorical perception of colour signals in a songbird

Eleanor M. Caves, Patrick A. Green, Matthew N. Zipple, Susan Peters, Sönke Johnsen and Stephen Nowicki ()
Additional contact information
Eleanor M. Caves: Duke University
Patrick A. Green: Duke University
Matthew N. Zipple: Duke University
Susan Peters: Duke University
Sönke Johnsen: Duke University
Stephen Nowicki: Duke University

Nature, 2018, vol. 560, issue 7718, 365-367

Abstract: Abstract In many contexts, animals assess each other using signals that vary continuously across individuals and, on average, reflect variation in the quality of the signaller1,2. It is often assumed that signal receivers perceive and respond continuously to continuous variation in the signal2. Alternatively, perception and response may be discontinuous3, owing to limitations in discrimination, categorization or both. Discrimination is the ability to tell two stimuli apart (for example, whether one can tell apart colours close to each other in hue). Categorization concerns whether stimuli are grouped based on similarities (for example, identifying colours with qualitative similarities in hue as similar even if they can be distinguished)4. Categorical perception is a mechanism by which perceptual systems categorize continuously varying stimuli, making specific predictions about discrimination relative to category boundaries. Here we show that female zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata) categorically perceive a continuously variable assessment signal: the orange to red spectrum of male beak colour. Both predictions of categorical perception5 were supported: females (1) categorized colour stimuli that varied along a continuum and (2) showed increased discrimination between colours from opposite sides of a category boundary compared to equally different colours from within a category. To our knowledge, this is the first demonstration of categorical perception of signal-based colouration in a bird, with implications for understanding avian colour perception and signal evolution in general.

Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0377-7 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:nature:v:560:y:2018:i:7718:d:10.1038_s41586-018-0377-7

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/

DOI: 10.1038/s41586-018-0377-7

Access Statistics for this article

Nature is currently edited by Magdalena Skipper

More articles in Nature from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().