Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)

Autores
Freidin, Esteban; Kacelnik, Alex
Año de publicación
2011
Idioma
inglés
Tipo de recurso
artículo
Estado
versión publicada
Descripción
Both human and nonhuman decision-makers can deviate from optimal choice by making context-dependent choices. Because ignoring context information can be beneficial, this is called a "less-is-more effect." The fact that organisms are so sensitive to the context is thus paradoxical and calls for the inclusion of an ecological perspective. In an experiment with starlings, adding cues that identified the context impaired performance in simultaneous prey choices but improved it in sequential prey encounters, in which subjects could reject opportunities in order to search instead in the background. Because sequential prey encounters are likely to be more frequent in nature, storing and using contextual information appears to be ecologically rational on balance by conditioning acceptance of each opportunity to the relative richness of the background, even if this causes context-dependent suboptimal preferences in (less-frequent) simultaneous choices. In ecologically relevant scenarios, more information seems to be more.
Fil: Freidin, Esteban. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Centro de Recursos Naturales Renovables de la Zona Semiarida. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Centro de Recursos Naturales Renovables de la Zona Semiarida; Argentina
Fil: Kacelnik, Alex. University of Oxford; Reino Unido
Materia
Decision-Marking
Rationality
Starlings
Less-Is-More
Nivel de accesibilidad
acceso abierto
Condiciones de uso
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/ar/
Repositorio
CONICET Digital (CONICET)
Institución
Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas
OAI Identificador
oai:ri.conicet.gov.ar:11336/16145

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spelling Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)Freidin, EstebanKacelnik, AlexDecision-MarkingRationalityStarlingsLess-Is-Morehttps://purl.org/becyt/ford/1.6https://purl.org/becyt/ford/1Both human and nonhuman decision-makers can deviate from optimal choice by making context-dependent choices. Because ignoring context information can be beneficial, this is called a "less-is-more effect." The fact that organisms are so sensitive to the context is thus paradoxical and calls for the inclusion of an ecological perspective. In an experiment with starlings, adding cues that identified the context impaired performance in simultaneous prey choices but improved it in sequential prey encounters, in which subjects could reject opportunities in order to search instead in the background. Because sequential prey encounters are likely to be more frequent in nature, storing and using contextual information appears to be ecologically rational on balance by conditioning acceptance of each opportunity to the relative richness of the background, even if this causes context-dependent suboptimal preferences in (less-frequent) simultaneous choices. In ecologically relevant scenarios, more information seems to be more.Fil: Freidin, Esteban. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Centro de Recursos Naturales Renovables de la Zona Semiarida. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Centro de Recursos Naturales Renovables de la Zona Semiarida; ArgentinaFil: Kacelnik, Alex. University of Oxford; Reino UnidoAmerican Association for the Advancement of Science2011-11info:eu-repo/semantics/articleinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersionhttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_6501info:ar-repo/semantics/articuloapplication/pdfapplication/pdfhttp://hdl.handle.net/11336/16145Freidin, Esteban; Kacelnik, Alex; Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris); American Association for the Advancement of Science; Science; 334; 6058; 11-2011; 1000-10020036-8075enginfo:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.1126/science.1209626info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/url/http://science.sciencemag.org/content/334/6058/1000info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccesshttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/ar/reponame:CONICET Digital (CONICET)instname:Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas2025-09-29T10:41:49Zoai:ri.conicet.gov.ar:11336/16145instacron:CONICETInstitucionalhttp://ri.conicet.gov.ar/Organismo científico-tecnológicoNo correspondehttp://ri.conicet.gov.ar/oai/requestdasensio@conicet.gov.ar; lcarlino@conicet.gov.arArgentinaNo correspondeNo correspondeNo correspondeopendoar:34982025-09-29 10:41:50.106CONICET Digital (CONICET) - Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicasfalse
dc.title.none.fl_str_mv Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)
title Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)
spellingShingle Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)
Freidin, Esteban
Decision-Marking
Rationality
Starlings
Less-Is-More
title_short Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)
title_full Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)
title_fullStr Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)
title_full_unstemmed Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)
title_sort Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris)
dc.creator.none.fl_str_mv Freidin, Esteban
Kacelnik, Alex
author Freidin, Esteban
author_facet Freidin, Esteban
Kacelnik, Alex
author_role author
author2 Kacelnik, Alex
author2_role author
dc.subject.none.fl_str_mv Decision-Marking
Rationality
Starlings
Less-Is-More
topic Decision-Marking
Rationality
Starlings
Less-Is-More
purl_subject.fl_str_mv https://purl.org/becyt/ford/1.6
https://purl.org/becyt/ford/1
dc.description.none.fl_txt_mv Both human and nonhuman decision-makers can deviate from optimal choice by making context-dependent choices. Because ignoring context information can be beneficial, this is called a "less-is-more effect." The fact that organisms are so sensitive to the context is thus paradoxical and calls for the inclusion of an ecological perspective. In an experiment with starlings, adding cues that identified the context impaired performance in simultaneous prey choices but improved it in sequential prey encounters, in which subjects could reject opportunities in order to search instead in the background. Because sequential prey encounters are likely to be more frequent in nature, storing and using contextual information appears to be ecologically rational on balance by conditioning acceptance of each opportunity to the relative richness of the background, even if this causes context-dependent suboptimal preferences in (less-frequent) simultaneous choices. In ecologically relevant scenarios, more information seems to be more.
Fil: Freidin, Esteban. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Centro de Recursos Naturales Renovables de la Zona Semiarida. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Centro de Recursos Naturales Renovables de la Zona Semiarida; Argentina
Fil: Kacelnik, Alex. University of Oxford; Reino Unido
description Both human and nonhuman decision-makers can deviate from optimal choice by making context-dependent choices. Because ignoring context information can be beneficial, this is called a "less-is-more effect." The fact that organisms are so sensitive to the context is thus paradoxical and calls for the inclusion of an ecological perspective. In an experiment with starlings, adding cues that identified the context impaired performance in simultaneous prey choices but improved it in sequential prey encounters, in which subjects could reject opportunities in order to search instead in the background. Because sequential prey encounters are likely to be more frequent in nature, storing and using contextual information appears to be ecologically rational on balance by conditioning acceptance of each opportunity to the relative richness of the background, even if this causes context-dependent suboptimal preferences in (less-frequent) simultaneous choices. In ecologically relevant scenarios, more information seems to be more.
publishDate 2011
dc.date.none.fl_str_mv 2011-11
dc.type.none.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/article
info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion
http://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_6501
info:ar-repo/semantics/articulo
format article
status_str publishedVersion
dc.identifier.none.fl_str_mv http://hdl.handle.net/11336/16145
Freidin, Esteban; Kacelnik, Alex; Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris); American Association for the Advancement of Science; Science; 334; 6058; 11-2011; 1000-1002
0036-8075
url http://hdl.handle.net/11336/16145
identifier_str_mv Freidin, Esteban; Kacelnik, Alex; Rational choice, context dependence, and the value of information in European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris); American Association for the Advancement of Science; Science; 334; 6058; 11-2011; 1000-1002
0036-8075
dc.language.none.fl_str_mv eng
language eng
dc.relation.none.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.1126/science.1209626
info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/url/http://science.sciencemag.org/content/334/6058/1000
dc.rights.none.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/ar/
eu_rights_str_mv openAccess
rights_invalid_str_mv https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/ar/
dc.format.none.fl_str_mv application/pdf
application/pdf
dc.publisher.none.fl_str_mv American Association for the Advancement of Science
publisher.none.fl_str_mv American Association for the Advancement of Science
dc.source.none.fl_str_mv reponame:CONICET Digital (CONICET)
instname:Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas
reponame_str CONICET Digital (CONICET)
collection CONICET Digital (CONICET)
instname_str Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas
repository.name.fl_str_mv CONICET Digital (CONICET) - Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas
repository.mail.fl_str_mv dasensio@conicet.gov.ar; lcarlino@conicet.gov.ar
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