Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Decision-making theories: linking the disparate research areas of individual and collective cognition

  • Review
  • Published:
Animal Cognition Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

In order to maximize their fitness, animals have to deal with different environmental and social factors that affect their everyday life. Although the way an animal behaves might enhance its fitness or survival in regard to one factor, it could compromise them regarding another. In the domain of decision sciences, research concerning decision making focuses on performances at the individual level but also at the collective one. However, between individual and collective decision making, different terms are used resulting in little or no connection between both research areas. In this paper, we reviewed how different branches of decision sciences study the same concept, mainly called speed-accuracy trade-off, and how the different results are on the same track in terms of showing the optimality of decisions. Whatever the level, individual or collective, each decision might be defined with three parameters: time or delay to decide, risk and accuracy. We strongly believe that more progress would be possible in this domain of research if these different branches were better linked, with an exchange of their results and theories. A growing amount of literature describes economics in humans and eco-ethology in birds making compromises between starvation, predation and reproduction. Numerous studies have been carried out on social cognition in primates but also birds and carnivores, and other publications describe market or reciprocal exchanges of commodities. We therefore hope that this paper will lead these different areas to a common decision science.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Abbott KR, Sherratt TN (2011) The evolution of superstition through optimal use of incomplete information. Anim Behav 82:85–92

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Addessi E, Mancini A, Crescimbene L, Visalberghi E (2011a) How social context, token value, and time course affect token exchange in capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella). Int J Primatol 32:83–98

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Addessi E, Paglieri F, Focaroli V (2011b) The ecological rationality of delay tolerance: insights from capuchin monkeys. Cognition 119:142–147

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Bateson M, Healy SD, Hurly TA (2002) Irrational choices in hummingbird foraging behaviour. Anim Behav 63:587–596

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Beck J, Forstmeier W (2007) Superstition and belief as inevitable by-products of an adaptive learning strategy. Hum Nat 18:35–46

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bogacz R (2007) Optimal decision-making theories: linking neurobiology with behaviour. Trends Cogn Sci 11:118–125

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Boos M, Zimmer C, Carriere A, Robin J-P, Petit O (2007) Post-hatching parental care behaviour and hormonal status in a precocial bird. Behav Proc 76:206–214

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bourjade M, Sueur C (2010) Shared or unshared consensus for collective movement? Towards methodological concerns. Behav Proc 84:648–652

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bourjade M, Thierry B, Maumy M, Petit O (2009) Decision-making in Przewalski horses (Equus ferus przewalskii) is driven by the ecological contexts of collective movements. Ethology 115:321–330

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Britten KH, Shadlen MN, Newsome WT, Movshon JA (1993) Responses of neurons in macaque MT to stochastic motion signals. Vis Neurosci 10:1157–1169

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Burns JG, Dyer AG (2008) Diversity of speed-accuracy strategies benefits social insects. Curr Biol 18:R953–R954

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Byrne RW (2000) How monkeys find their way: leadership, coordination, and cognitive maps of African baboons. In: Boinski S, Garber PA (eds) On the move: how and why animals travel in groups. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, pp 491–518

    Google Scholar 

  • Chittka L, Dyer AG, Bock F, Dornhaus A (2003) Psychophysics: bees trade off foraging speed for accuracy. Nature 424:388

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Chittka L, Skorupski P, Raine NE (2009) Speed–accuracy tradeoffs in animal decision making. Trends Ecol Evol 24:400–407

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Cohen LJ (1981) Can human irrationality be experimentally demonstrated? Behav Brain Sci 4:317–331

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Conradt L (2011) Collective behaviour: when it pays to share decisions. Nature 471:40–41

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Conradt L, Roper T (2005) Consensus decision making in animals. Trends Ecol Evol 20:449–456

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Conradt L, Roper TJ (2009) Conflicts of interest and the evolution of decision sharing. Phil Trans R Soc B Biol Sci 364:807–819

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cook EP, Maunsell JHR (2002) Dynamics of neuronal responses in macaque MT and VIP during motion detection. Nature Neurosci 5:985–994

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Couzin ID (2009) Collective cognition in animal groups. Trends Cogn Sci 13:36–43

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Couzin ID, Krause J (2003) Self-Organization and Collective Behavior in Vertebrates. Academic Press, In, pp 1–75

    Google Scholar 

  • Czaczkes TJ, Grüter C, Jones SM, Ratnieks FLW (2011) Synergy between social and private information increases foraging efficiency in ants. Biol Lett 7:521–524

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Dall SRX, Giraldeau L-A, Olsson O, McNamara JM, Stephens DW (2005) Information and its use by animals in evolutionary ecology. Trend Ecol Evol 20:187–193

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Danchin E, Giraldeau LA, Valone TJ, Wagner RH (2005) Defining the concept of public information—response. Sci 308:355–356

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Dufour V, Pelé M, Sterck EHM, Thierry B (2007) Chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) anticipation of food return: coping with waiting time in an exchange task. J Comp Psychol 121:145–155

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Dufour V, Wascher CAF, Braun A, Miller R, Bugnyar T (2012) Corvids can decide if a future exchange is worth waiting for. Biol Lett 8:201–204

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Dyer AG, Chittka L (2004) Bumblebees (Bombus terrestris) sacrifice foraging speed to solve difficult colour discrimination tasks. J Comp Physiol A 190:759–763

    Google Scholar 

  • Edwards A, Phillips R, Watkins N, Freeman M, Murphy E, Afanasyev V, Buldyrev S, da Luz M, Raposo E, Stanley H, Viswanathan G (2007) Revisiting Levy flight search patterns of wandering albatrosses, bumblebees and deer. Nautre 449:1044–1048

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Farmer JD, Foley D (2009) The economy needs agent-based modelling. Nature 460:685–686

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Fawcett TW, McNamara JM, Houston AI (2012) When is it adaptive to be patient? A general framework for evaluating delayed rewards. Behav Proc 89:128–136

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Feher da Silva C, Baldo MVC (2012) A simple artificial life model explains irrational behavior in human decision-making. PLoS ONE 7:e34371

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Fletcher GE, Warneken F, Tomasello M (2012) Differences in cognitive processes underlying the collaborative activities of children and chimpanzees. Cogn Development 27:136–153

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Foster KR, Kokko H (2009) The evolution of superstitious and superstition-like behaviour. Proc R Soc B Lond 276:31–37

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Franks NR, Pratt SC, Mallon EB, Britton NF, Sumpter DJT (2002) Information flow, opinion polling and collective intelligence in house–hunting social insects. Phil Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 357:1567–1583

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Franks NR, Dornhaus A, Fitzsimmons JP, Stevens M (2003) Speed versus accuracy in collective decision making. Proc R Soc B Lond 270:2457–2463

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fruteau C, Voelkl B, van Damme E, Noë R (2009) Supply and demand determine the market value of food providers in wild vervet monkeys. Proc Nat Acad Sci 106:12007–12012

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gigerenzer G (2002) Bounded Rationality: The Adaptive Toolbox. MIT Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  • Gigerenzer G (2003) Calculated Risks: How to Know When Numbers Deceive You. Simon and Schuster, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Glimcher PW (2009) Neuroeconomics: Decision Making and the Brain. Academic Press, USA

    Google Scholar 

  • Gold JI, Shadlen MN (2007) The neural basis of decision making. Annu Rev Neurosci 30:535–574

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gould JP (1974) Risk, stochastic preference, and the value of information. J Eco Theor 8:64–84

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Green L, Myerson J (1996) Exponential versus hyperbolic discounting of delayed outcomes: risk and waiting time. Amer Zool 36:496–505

    Google Scholar 

  • Grodzinski U, Johnstone RA (2012) Parents and offspring in an evolutionary game: the effect of supply on demand when costs of care vary. Proc R Soc B 279:109–115

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Helbing D (ed) (2012) Social Self-Organization: Agent-Based Simulations and Experiments to Study Emergent Social Behavior. Springer, Berlin Heidelberg

    Google Scholar 

  • Helbing D, Farkas I, Vicsek T (2000) Simulating dynamical features of escape panic. Nature 407:487–490

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Higginson AD, McNamara JM, Houston AI (2012) The starvation-predation trade-off predicts trends in body size, muscularity, and adiposity between and within taxa. Am Nat 179:338–350

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Hill RA, Lee PC (1998) Predation risk as an influence on group size in cercopithecoid primates: implications for social structure. J Zool 245:447–456

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hinde CA, Johnstone RA, Kilner RM (2010) Parent-offspring conflict and coadaptation. Science 327:1373–1376

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Houston AI, McNamara JM (1999) Models of Adaptive Behaviour: An Approach Based on State. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  • Houston AI, McNamara JM, Hutchinson JMC (1993) General results concerning the trade-off between gaining energy and avoiding predation. Phil Trans R Soc Lond B 341:375–397

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ings TC, Chittka L (2008) Speed-accuracy tradeoffs and false alarms in bee responses to cryptic predators. Curr Biol 18:1520–1524

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Jacobs A, Maumy M, Petit O (2008) The influence of social organisation on leadership in brown lemurs (Eulemur fulvus fulvus) in a controlled environment. Behav Proc 79:111–113

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Janson C, Byrne R (2007) What wild primates know about resources: opening up the black box. Anim Cogn 10:357–367

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Janson CH, Goldsmith ML (1995) Predicting group size in primates: foraging costs and predation risks. Behav Ecol 6:326–336

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Johnson SE (2003) Life history and the competitive environment: trajectories of growth, maturation, and reproductive output among chacma baboons. Am J Phys Anthropol 120:83–98

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Johnstone RA, Hinde CA (2006) Negotiation over offspring care—how should parents respond to each other’s efforts? Behav Ecol 17:818–827

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kagel JH, Green L, Caraco T (1986) When foragers discount the future: constraint or adaptation? Anim Behav 34:271–283

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • King AJ (2010) Follow me! I’m a leader if you do; I’m a failed initiator if you don’t? Behav Proc 84:671–674

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kokko H, Brooks R, McNamara JM, Houston AI (2002) The sexual selection continuum. Proc R Soc Lond B 269:1331–1340

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Krama T, Vrublevska J, Freeberg TM, Kullberg C, Rantala MJ, Krams I (2012) You mob my owl, I’ll mob yours: birds play tit-for-tat game. Sci Rep 2

  • Kulldorff M, Davis RL, Kolczak M, Lewis E, Lieu T, Platt R (2011) A maximized sequential probability ratio test for drug and vaccine safety surveillance. Sequential Analysis 30:58–78

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Latty T, Beekman M (2011a) Speed–accuracy trade-offs during foraging decisions in the acellular slime mould Physarum polycephalum. Proc R Soci B Biol Sci 208:539–545

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Latty T, Beekman M (2011b) Irrational decision-making in an amoeboid organism: transitivity and context-dependent preferences. Proc R Soc B Biol Sci 278:307–312

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lee D (2005) Neuroeconomics: making risky choices in the brain. Nat Neurosci 8:1129–1130

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Leonardi RJ, Vick S-J, Dufour V (2012) Waiting for more: the performance of domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) on exchange tasks. Anim Cogn 15:107–120

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Lihoreau M, Raine NE, Reynolds AM, Stelzer RJ, Lim KS, Smith AD, Osborne JL, Chittka L (2012) Radar tracking and motion-sensitive cameras on flowers reveal the development of pollinator multi-destination routes over large spatial scales. PLoS Biol 10:e1001392

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Lihoreau M, Raine NE, Reynolds AM, Stelzer RJ, Lim KS, Smith AD, Osborne JL, Chittka L (2013) Unravelling the mechanisms of trapline foraging in bees. Commun Integr Biol 6:e22701

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • MacIntosh AJJ, Jacobs A, Garcia C, Shimizu K, Mouri K, Huffman MA, Hernandez AD (2012) Monkeys in the middle: parasite transmission through the social network of a wild primate. PLoS ONE 7:e51144

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Marshall JAR, Dornhaus A, Franks NR, Kovacs T (2006) Noise, cost and speed-accuracy trade-offs: decision-making in a decentralized system. J R Soc Interface 3:243–254

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Marshall JAR, Bogacz R, Dornhaus A, Planqué R, Kovacs T, Franks NR (2009) On optimal decision-making in brains and social insect colonies. J R Soc Interface 6:1065–1074

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • McCoy AN, Platt ML (2005) Expectations and outcomes: decision-making in the primate brain. J Comp Physiol A 191:201–211

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McNamara JM, Houston AI (1990) The value of fat reserves and the tradeoff between starvation and predation. Acta Biotheor 38:37–61

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • McNamara J, Houston A (1996) State-dependent life histories. Nature 380:215–221

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • McNamara JM, Houston AI (2009) Integrating function and mechanism. Trends Ecol Evol 24:670–675

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Menzel CR (1991) Cognitive aspects of foraging in Japanese monkeys. Anim Behav 41:397–402

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mettke-Hofmann C, Winkler H, Leisler B (2002) The significance of ecological factors for exploration and neophobia in parrots. Ethology 108:249–272

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Meunier J, Kölliker M (2012) Parental antagonism and parent–offspring co-adaptation interact to shape family life. Proc R Soc B 279:3981–3988

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Moussaïd M, Helbing D, Theraulaz G (2011) How simple rules determine pedestrian behavior and crowd disasters. Proc Nat Acad Sci 108:6884–6888

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Myerson J, Green L, Warusawitharana M (2001) Area under the curve as a measure of discounting. J Exp Anal Behav 76:235–243

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Nagengast AJ, Braun DA, Wolpert DM (2010) Risk-sensitive optimal feedback control accounts for sensorimotor behavior under uncertainty. PLoS Comput Biol 6:e1000857

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Nagengast AJ, Braun DA, Wolpert DM (2011a) Risk sensitivity in a motor task with speed-accuracy trade-off. J Neurophysiol 105:2668–2674

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Nagengast AJ, Braun DA, Wolpert DM (2011b) Risk-sensitivity and the mean-variance trade-off: decision making in sensorimotor control. Proc Biol Sci Lond B Biol Sci 278:2325–2332

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Neyman J, Pearson ES (1933) On the problem of the most efficient tests of statistical hypotheses. Phil Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 231:289–337

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nunn CL, Altizer S, Altizer SM (2006) Infectious diseases in primates: behavior, ecology and evolution. Oxford University Press, Oxford

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Parker GA, Royle NJ, Hartley IR (2002) Intrafamilial conflict and parental investment: a synthesis. Phil Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci B 357:295–307

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Parrish JK, Edelstein-Keshet L (1999) Complexity, pattern, and evolutionary trade-offs in animal aggregation. Science 284:99–101

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Pelé M, Dufour V, Micheletta J, Thierry B (2010) Long-tailed macaques display unexpected waiting abilities in exchange tasks. Anim Cogn 13:263–271

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Pelé M, Micheletta J, Uhlrich P, Thierry B, Dufour V (2011) Delay maintenance in Tonkean macaques (Macaca tonkeana) and brown capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella). Int J Primatol 32:149–166

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Petit O, Gautrais J, Leca J, Theraulaz G, Deneubourg J (2009) Collective decision-making in white-faced capuchin monkeys. Proc R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 276:3495–3503

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Pillot MH, Gautrais J, Gouello J, Michelena P, Sibbald A, Bon R (2010) Moving together: incidental leaders and naïve followers. Behav Proc 83:235–241

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Platt ML, Huettel SA (2008) Risky business: the neuroeconomics of decision making under uncertainty. Nat Neurosci 11:398–403

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Powell M, Ansic D (1997) Gender differences in risk behaviour in financial decision-making: an experimental analysis. J Econ Psychol 18:605–628

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ramseyer A, Pelé M, Dufour V, Chauvin C, Thierry B (2006) Accepting loss: the temporal limits of reciprocity in brown capuchin monkeys. Proc R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 273:179–184

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ramseyer A, Petit O, Thierry B (2009) Decision-making in group departures of female domestic geese. Behaviour 146:351–371

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Randell B (2012) A Turing Enigma. In: Koutny M, Ulidowski I (eds) CONCUR 2012—Concurrency Theory. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer Berlin Heidelberg, pp 23–36

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Raubenheimer D, Simpson SJ, Mayntz D (2009) Nutrition, ecology and nutritional ecology: toward an integrated framework. Funct Ecol 23:4–16

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Roitman JD, Shadlen MN (2002) Response of neurons in the lateral intraparietal area during a combined visual discrimination reaction time task. J Neurosci 22:9475–9489

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Seeley TD, Visscher PK (2004) Quorum sensing during nest-site selection by honeybee swarms. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 56:594–601

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shepard RN (1994) Perceptual-cognitive universals as reflections of the world. Psychon Bull Rev 1:2–28

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stephens DW (2002) Discrimination, discounting and impulsivity: a role for an informational constraint. Phil Trans R Soc Lond B 357:1527–1537

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stevens J, Cushman F, Hauser M (2005) Evolving the psychological mechanisms for cooperation. Faculty Publications, Department of Psychology

  • Sueur C (2010) Influence Des Relations Sociales Sur Les Prises de Décisions. Editions

  • Sueur C (2011a) Social Network, Information Flow and Decision-Making Efficiency: A Comparison of Humans and Animals. In: Social Networking and Community Behavior Modeling

  • Sueur C (2011b) A non-lévy random walk in Chacma baboons: What does it mean? PLoS ONE 6:e16131

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Sueur C (2012) Viability of decision-making systems in human and animal groups. J Theor Biol 306:93–103

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Sueur C, Deneubourg J-L (2011) Self-organization in primates: understanding the rules underlying collective movements. Int J Primatol 32:1413–1432

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sueur C, Petit O (2008) Shared or unshared consensus decision in macaques? Behav Proc 78:84–92

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Sueur C, Petit O (2010) Signals use by leaders in Macaca tonkeana and Macaca mulatta: group-mate recruitment and behaviour monitoring. Anim Cogn 13:239–248

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Sueur C, Petit O, Deneubourg J (2009) Selective mimetism at departure in collective movements of Macaca tonkeana: an experimental and theoretical approach. Anim Behav 78:1087–1095

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sueur C, Deneubourg J-L, Petit O (2010) Sequence of quorums during collective decision making in macaques. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 64:1875–1885

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sueur C, Briard L, Petit O (2011a) Individual analyses of Lévy walk in semi-free ranging Tonkean macaques (Macaca tonkeana). PLoS ONE 6:e26788

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Sueur C, Deneubourg JL, Petit O (2011b) From the first intention movement to the last joiner: macaques combine mimetic rules to optimize their collective decisions. Proc R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 278:1697–1704

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Sueur C, King AJ, Pelé M, Petit O (2012) Fast and accurate decisions as a result of scale-free network properties in two primate species. Springer, Lecture Notes in Computer Science

    Google Scholar 

  • Sumpter DJT, Pratt SC (2009) Quorum responses and consensus decision making. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 364:743–753

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Todd PM, Gigerenzer G (2000) Précis of Simple heuristics that make us smart. Behav Brain Sci 23:727–741

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Topal J, Miklosi A, Gacsi M, Doka A, Pongracz P, Kubinyi E, Viranyi Z, Csanyi V (2009) The Dog as a Model for Understanding Human Social Behavior. In: Brockmann HJ, Roper TJ, Naguib M, WynneEdwards KE, Mitani JC, Simmons LW (eds) Advances in the Study of Behavior, vol 39. Elsevier Academic Press Inc, San Diego, pp 71–116

    Google Scholar 

  • Usher M, Mcclelland JL (2001) The time course of perceptual choice : the leaky, competing accumulator model. Psych Rev 108:550–592

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • van de Waal E, Kruetzen M, Hula J, Goudet J, Bshary R (2012) Similarity in food cleaning techniques within matrilines in wild vervet monkeys. PLoS ONE 7:e35694

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Viswanathan GM, Afanasyev V, Buldyrev SV, Murphy EJ, Prince PA, Stanley HE (1996) Lévy flight search patterns of wandering albatrosses. Nature 381:413–415

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Wainer H, Savage S (2012) The theory that would not die: how Bayes’ rule cracked the enigma code, hunted down Russian submarines and emerged triumphant from two centuries of controversy. by McGrayne. Sharon Bertsch. J Educ Measur 49:214–219

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wald A, Wolfowitz J (1948) Optimum character of the sequential probability ratio test. Ann Math Statist 19:326–339

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ward AJW, Herbert-Read JE, Sumpter DJT, Krause J (2011) Fast and accurate decisions through collective vigilance in fish shoals. Proc Nat Acad Sci 108:2312–2315

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Wei W, Qi X-G, Guo S-T, Zhao D-P, Zhang P, Huang K, Li B-G (2012) Market powers predict reciprocal grooming in golden snub-nosed monkeys (Rhinopithecus roxellana). PLoS ONE 7:e36802

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Wolf M, Weissing FJ (2012) Animal personalities: consequences for ecology and evolution. Trends Ecol Evol 27:452–461

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Wolf M, Kurvers RHJM, Ward AJW, Krause S, Krause J (2013) Accurate decisions in an uncertain world: collective cognition increases true positives while decreasing false positives. Proc R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 280:1471–2954

    Google Scholar 

  • Wood JN, Glynn DD, Phillips BC, Hauser MD (2007) The perception of rational, goal-directed action in nonhuman primates. Science 317:1402–1405

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Zimmer C, Boos M, Poulin N, Gosler A, Petit O, Robin J-P (2011) Evidence of the trade-off between starvation and predation risks in ducks. PLoS ONE 6:e22352

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

CS was funded by the Fyssen Foundation and the USIAS (University of Strasbourg Institute for Advanced Studies). We thank Joanna Munro (Munro Language Services) for English editing.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ethobiosciences, Research and Consultancy Agency in Animal Wellbeing and Behaviour, Strasbourg, France

    Marie Pelé

  2. Département Ecologie, Physiologie et Ethologie, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Strasbourg, France

    Cédric Sueur

  3. Institut Pluridisciplinaire Hubert Curien, Université de Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France

    Cédric Sueur

  4. Unit of Social Ecology, Université libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium

    Cédric Sueur

Authors
  1. Marie Pelé
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Cédric Sueur
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Cédric Sueur.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Pelé, M., Sueur, C. Decision-making theories: linking the disparate research areas of individual and collective cognition. Anim Cogn 16, 543–556 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-013-0631-1

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-013-0631-1

Keywords

Search

Navigation