Taking an integrative approach to study animal visual perception: lessons from mate choice to mutualism
Abstract:
Animal behavior begins with sensory input that is used to create a perceptual representation upon which the behavior is based, and can have important fitness consequences. Thus, links exist between sensory systems, perception, behavior, and evolution. My research explores these links, asking: How do sensory and perceptual experiences mediate animal interactions? How does sensory perception play out in the natural world, and what are its evolutionary consequences? Perception is the result of factors including the form of a stimulus, the environment in which the stimulus is transmitted, the physiology of sensory organs, and perceptual processing that occurs in the brain or other higherorder centers. Increasing research shows that to understand perception, we must account for each of these factors, and that assumptions about perception based on the properties of physical stimuli and/or sensory physiology alone provide an incomplete picture. In this talk, I will cover three vignettes: size perception during mate choice in swordtail fish, color perception during mate choice in zebra finches, and partner perception during cleaning mutualisms in tropical shrimp and fish. In each, I discuss how behavioral responses to visual signals cannot be explained solely by sensory physiology and stimulus form. I hope to show how taking an integrative approach, and bringing together contributions and viewpoints from numerous fields, including both field and laboratory perspectives, can uniquely enable contributions to our understanding of how sensory perception influences behavior, ecology, and evolution. Abstract: Animal behavior begins with sensory input that is used to create a perceptual representation upon which the behavior is based, and can have important fitness consequences. Thus, links exist between sensory systems, perception, behavior, and evolution. My research explores these links, asking: How do sensory and perceptual experiences mediate animal interactions? How does sensory perception play out in the natural world, and what are its evolutionary consequences? Perception is the result of factors including the form of a stimulus, the environment in which the stimulus is transmitted, the physiology of sensory organs, and perceptual processing that occurs in the brain or other higherorder centers. Increasing research shows that to understand perception, we must account for each of these factors, and that assumptions about perception based on the properties of physical stimuli and/or sensory physiology alone provide an incomplete picture. In this talk, I will cover three vignettes: size perception during mate choice in swordtail fish, color perception during mate choice in zebra finches, and partner perception during cleaning mutualisms in tropical shrimp and fish. In each, I discuss how behavioral responses to visual signals cannot be explained solely by sensory physiology and stimulus form. I hope to show how taking an integrative approach, and bringing together contributions and viewpoints from numerous fields, including both field and laboratory perspectives, can uniquely enable contributions to our understanding of how sensory perception influences behavior, ecology, and evolution.
SENG Bldg. Room# 305
Genevieve Kozak
(508) 999-3149
gkozak@umassd.edu