Deck 19: Group Living, Altruism, and Cooperation

Question 1

The authors of your text quote Roger Fouts as having said, "One chimpanzee is no chimpanzee." Fouts was suggesting that

A) chimpanzee groups are seasonal and shortlived rather than lifelong.
B) chimpanzees really don't recognize one another as individuals.
C) chimpanzees tend to respond in a uniform way to the same features of the environment and thus independently, and frequently, end up at the same place.
D) interaction with other chimpanzees is deeply ingrained into every aspect of a chimpanzee's life.

Answer 1

interaction with other chimpanzees is deeply ingrained into every aspect of a chimpanzee's life.

Question 2

Which of the following would NOT be considered a benefit of group living?

A) conservation of water and heat
B) decreased predation
C) improved foraging
D) interference with reproduction

Answer 2

interference with reproduction

Question 3

A major benefit of group living in Harris hawks (Parabuteo unicinctus) is

A) access to food location information from other group members.
B) decreased risk of parasitism.
C) decreased risk of predation.
D) increased probability of killing prey.

Answer 3

increased probability of killing prey.

Question 4

If you were a Harris hawk, you would maximize your individual calorie intake per day by being part of a family group of what size?

A) 1 (i.e., remaining solitary)
B) 2
C) 3-4
D) 5-6

Question 5

A way in which group living might increase foraging success is that communal roosts or colonies might

A) act as information centers regarding the location of food.
B) insure that killed prey is shared by all members of the group.
C) make a flush-and-ambush tactic much more successful.
D) all of the above.

Question 6

The "many eyes" hypothesis, the dilution effect, and the selfish herd are all ideas that make reference to the potential benefit that might accrue to an individual by living in a group regarding

A) conservation of water and heat.
B) decreased energetic costs of movement.
C) decreased risk of predation.
D) improved foraging.

Question 7

The metabolic rates of emperor penguins (Aptenodytes forsteri) in small groups are reduced by 39% compared to isolated birds; those of penguins in larger groups are reduced by another 21%. This is an example of a benefit of group living related to

A) conservation of water and heat.
B) decreased energetic costs of movement.
C) decreased risk of predation.
D) improved foraging.

Question 8

Which of the following is a major cost of group living for many species?

A) increased competition for food.
B) increased interference with reproduction.
C) increased risk of parasitism.
D) all of the above.

Question 9

Raouf and colleagues (2006) found that cliff swallow colony size is correlated with higher levels of glucocorticoid hormones. They further demonstrated that the stress was being produced by

A) a outbreak of nest robbing that would begin when some colony sizes exceeded normal levels.
B) high numbers of parasitic swallow bugs.
C) intense feeding competition within some of the colonies.
D) unusually aggressive forms of mate competition among the males of some colonies.

Question 10

Raouf and colleagues (2006) found that cliff swallow colony size is correlated with levels of glucocorticoid hormones. They further demonstrated that the stress being displayed was related to the presence of parasitic swallow bugs rather than a response to other aspects of group living, such as competition for food. They accomplished this by

A) capturing each bird individually in some colonies and gently removing all swallow bugs by hand.
B) fumigating some colonies in order to kill the parasites.
C) reducing the size of some colony sites to encourage instances of allopreening among group members.
D) supplementing the normal foraging efforts of some colonies by providing additional food.

Question 11

It has been suggested that the best explanation for Mexican free-tailed bat females (Tardarida brasiliensis mexicana) suckling other females' pups is

A) kin selection.
B) mistaken identity.
C) reciprocation.
D) subtle selfishmess.

Question 12

That a Belding's ground squirrel will bark a predator alarm to which others respond by scurrying to safety, or that wild turkey males form coalitions to court females when only the dominant one of the group mates, are of interest because these actions

A) appear to benefit other individuals at a cost to the actor.
B) appear to benefit the actor at a cost to other individuals.
C) are actually easily explained by Darwin's earliest theories.
D) seem as though they should spread quickly through the population.

Question 13

Behaviors believed to be altruistic

A) are behaviors that raise the fitness of another individual at the expense of the altruist's direct fitness.
B) may turn out on closer examination to produce personal gains in fitness that outweigh the cost to the actor.
C) have been demonstrated by mathematical modeling to be capable of spreading throughout a population.
D) all of the above.

Question 14

The name most closely associated with changing our ideas regarding altruism is

A) C. Darwin.
B) F. von Frisch.
C) N. Tinbergen.
D) W. D. Hamilton.

Question 15

Which of the following is an accurate representation of the rule that has been proposed to predict when a gene for an altruistic behavior will spread in a population?

A) B/C > 1/r
B) B/C < 1/r
C) B/r > 1/C
D) C/r = 0

Question 16

In order to predict that a particular altruistic behavior will be directed to a half-sibling, theory suggests that the benefit to the receiver must exceed the cost to the actor by at least ____ times.

A) 2
B) 4
C) 6
D) 8

Question 17

The rule that predicts when an altruistic behavior will be performed includes the symbols, B, C, and r. In this context, the symbol C represents the

A) coefficient of fitness.
B) coefficient of relatedness.
C) cost to the actor.
D) cost to the recipient.

Question 18

The rule that predicts when an altruistic behavior will be performed includes the symbols, B, C, and r. In this context, the symbol B represents the

A) number of extra offspring the actor produces because of the altruistic act.
B) number of extra offspring the recipient produces because of the altruistic act.
C) number of offspring the actor does not produce because of the altruistic act.
D) number of offspring the recipient does not produce because of the altruistic act.

Question 19

To calculate indirect fitness,

A) count the number of extra offspring that an individual gains by helping a relative, devalued by the genetic distance between the individual and the relative.
B) count the number of offspring that an individual has as a result of its own efforts.
C) count the number of offspring that an individual has as a result of its own efforts, devalued by its inclusive fitness.
D) sum direct fitness and inclusive fitness.

Question 20

For kin-biased behavior to occur, one must be able to distinguish kin from nonkin. Which of the following hypotheses has been proposed to explain how an animal might determine who its relatives are?

A) familiarity
B) location
C) phenotype matching
D) all of the above

Question 21

An individual animal that is following the rule, help those near home, may increase its inclusive fitness by directing altruistic behaviors toward other animals based on

A) their location.
B) familiarity.
C) phenotype matching.
D) recognition alleles.

Question 22

If kin are to be recognized when they encounter one another in different places, they cannot be relying on ______ to reliably discriminate one another.

A) familiarity.
B) location.
C) phenotype matching.
D) recognition alleles.

Question 23

Porter and colleagues (1981) found that when spiny mouse pups (Acomys cahirinus) are released into a test arena, they often huddle in pairs. Further, they will sometimes prefer to huddle with nonkin rather than kin. This is most likely to occur if

A) the situation is especially frightening.
B) they are siblings that were separated soon after birth and reared apart.
C) they are unrelated young that were reared apart.
D) they are unrelated young that were reared together.

Question 24

The use of a "recognition allele" to allow an individual to discriminate kin from nonkin differs from other proposed mechanisms primarily because it is proposed to be

A) a mechanism that will allow the individual to behave preferentially toward its kin.
B) dependent on learning.
C) genetically based.
D) present only in species with fairly sophisticated cognitive abilities.

Question 25

Demonstrating the existence of recognition alleles has proven quite difficult, primarily because

A) green beards occur too frequently to be useful research tools.
B) it is DIFFICULT to eliminate all possible opportunities for learning recognition cues during an animal's lifetime.
C) it is too DIFFICULT to understand the underlying processes that would have to exist to allow them to work.
D) not all species have a major histocompatibility complex (MHC).

Question 26

A distinguishing characteristic of reciprocal altruism is that it

A) is frequently directed at nonrelatives.
B) is most often directed at a relative.
C) is seldom found in mammals.
D) reverses the normal cost-benefit ratios.

Question 27

Altruistic acts are sometimes observed among nonrelatives. Trivers (1971) suggested that this is most likely to develop in species that have

A) good memories.
B) high dispersal rates.
C) short life spans.
D) all of the above.

Question 28

One possible strategy in Prisoner's Dilemma that can result in an evolutionarily stable strategy (ESS) is one in which the individual begins by being cooperative and then

A) always defects thereafter.
B) continues to cooperate thereafter.
C) matches the other party's actions thereafter.
D) retaliates only after the other individual has defected three times in a row.

Question 29

Vampire bats (Desmodus rotundus) meet the conditions that Trivers (1971) laid out that are favorable to the evolution of reciprocal altruism. For example,

A) blood is shared generously among bats regardless of their previous levels of association or their degrees of kinship.
B) on any given night, roughly 33% of juveniles less than two years old and 7% of older bats fail to feed and, thus, are likely to be in need of a favor.
C) the recipient of a blood meal may gain 12 hours of life, while the donor loses more than 36 hours of time until starvation.
D) all of the above.

Question 30

According to the work of Sherman (1977, 1980, 1985), during which he observed a colony of Belding's ground squirrels (Spermophilus beldingi), which of the following would be most likely to give an alarm call for a terrestrial predator?

A) a dominant older male
B) a juvenile female
C) a reproductive female with daughters present
D) a reproductive female with no kin present

Question 31

According to the work of Sherman (1977, 1980, 1985), during which he observed a colony of Belding's ground squirrels (Spermophilus beldingi), which of the following would be most likely to give an alarm call for a aerial predator?

A) a reproductive female with daughters present
B) a reproductive female with no kin present
C) an older, experienced individual on the outskirts of the colony at a safe distance from the predatory bird.
D) an individual in an exposed position and close to the predatory bird.

Question 32

Males of some species sometimes cooperate in acquiring a mate, but then only one of the group actually does most or all of the mating. For example, among wild turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo), male turkey brothers form a sibling unit that will remain stable until death, within which only the dominant male mates. Further, sibling units then compete to establish a hierarchy between units. Research by Krakauer (2005) suggests that the subordinate males provide their cooperative support as a result of

A) eusociality
B) kin selection
C) manipulation
D) reciprocal altruism

Question 33

Males of some species sometimes cooperate in acquiring a mate, but then only one of the group actually does most or all of the mating. For example, male lions (Panthera leo) form coalitions in order to acquire a harem of lionesses.

A) Coalitions of males will accept unrelated companions even after they have become residents in a pride.
B) Coalitions of three to six males are less successful in the long term than a coalition of only two males as a result of rivalries that inevitably develop within larger coalitions.
C) Long-term, successful coalitions are always made up of related individuals.
D) When experimentally presented with a stuffed "intruder" lion, lions attacked it, regardless of whether or not they were related to other members of the coalition.

Question 34

Males of some species sometimes cooperate in acquiring a mate, but then only one of the group actually does most or all of the mating. For example, in a small bird called the long-tailed manakin (Chiroxiphia linearis), two (or sometimes three) males perform remarkable acrobatic cooperative displays to attract a female. If a female is interested by the display, only one of the males, however, will mate with her, and it is always the same male. According to work by McDonald, Trainer, and colleagues (l994, 1995, 2002), it is unlikely that the males are related to one another. Further, performance of at least some parts of the display improve with age and practice. This suggests that a subordinate male participates in this cooperative display primarily because it eventually results in an increase in his

A) ability to reciprocate in the future.
B) direct fitness.
C) indirect fitness.
D) all of the above.

Question 35

Cooperative breeding, which has been described in many taxa,

A) involves few, if any, costs to the helpers.
B) is better studied using correlational methods than experimental methods.
C) is actually quite rare.
D) rarely results in actual fitness increases to the parents.

Question 36

Removing helpers and measuring the consequences, changing the ratio of helpers to young by temporarily removing or adding young, or using statistical analyses to control for particular variables are all techniques that have been employed to try to determine if helping

A) causes increased reproductive success in breeders.
B) is correlated with increased reproductive success in breeders.
C) is more common among birds than mammals.
D) is voluntary or coerced.

Question 37

Animals may delay dispersal and help their parents raise additional offspring because

A) mates are unavailable.
B) the available habitat for new territories is of poor quality.
C) the habitat is saturated and no space is available for them to new territories.
D) all of the above.

Question 38

Which of the following is NOT an example of a direct fitness benefit of helping behavior.

A) Among long-tailed tits, failed breeders helped at the nest of relatives rather than of nonrelatives.
B) Among pied kingfishers, helpers, which are unrelated to the breeders, may succeed in mating with the female they had assisted the previous year.
C) Among Seychelle's warblers, helpers may add their own eggs to a nest at which they are helping.
D) Among Seychelle's warblers, when they do acquire their own territory, former helpers are superior parents.

Question 39

For a species to be defined as eusocial it must display

A) at least some reproductive skew.
B) care of the young being provided by only the parents.
C) the presence of only a single generation at a time within a colony.
D) all of the above.

Question 40

Females of a haplodiploid species share 75% of their DNA with their

A) daughters.
B) half sisters.
C) full sisters.
D) mothers.

Question 41

The evidence that haplodiploidy makes the evolution of eusociality more likely

A) has been convincingly discredited.
B) is clear and strong.
C) is clear for mammals; less so for insects.
D) is under debate.