Communication and cooperation in silico and nature

Sociality involves repeated interactions among individual members of an animal group. Because sociality represents one of the major transitions in evolution, it remains a significant focus for behavioral ecologists. Two associated phenomena, communication and cooperation, are closely tied to sociality, and all three appear to be interdependent. Much research effort has been devoted to investigating sociality, communication, and cooperation, but how the three interact, how interdependent they are, and which, if any, precedes the others, remain open questions My dissertation focuses on the intersections among communication, sociality, and cooperation. Within the subsequent chapters of this dissertation, I investigate signaling systems and the interactions that may drive the evolution of signaling systems. I begin by investigating the evolution of a mimicking signal from an aposematic cue precursor and test the conditions that maintain the resulting dishonest signal. I then 1) quantify the repertoire of a socially complex and cooperative species, the spotted hyena, 2) test hypothesis about the information and transmission of information in one of their vocalizations, and 3) investigate a risky type of social behavior that likely played a role in shaping the communication system in this species.