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© 1991 International Society for Behavioral Ecology

research-article

Risk sensitivity in starlings: variability in food amount and food delay

Juan C. Reboreda and Alejandro Kacelnik

Sub-department of Animal Behaviour, University of Cambridge, Madingley, Cambridge, UK King's College, Cambridge, UK

Department of Zoology, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3PS, UK. J. C. Reboreda is now at the Instituto de Biologia y Medicina Experimental, Obligado 2490, 1428 Buenos Aires, Argentina.

ABSTRACT

Starlings' preferences for constant versus variable food sources were studied in the laboratory. The constant alternative gave a fixed amount of food after a fixed delay. The variable alternative offered either a varying amount of food after a fixed delay (treatment A) or a fixed amount of food after a variable delay (treatment B). In both treatments the ratio of amount of food over trial length (the sum of intertrial interval plus delay and handling times) of the constant alternative equaled the average of the two ratios of the variable alternative. The variable ratios were 30% higher and 30% smaller than the fixed ratio. In free-choice trials (both options available in each trial), the subjects were risk-averse or indifferent in treatment A and indifferent or riskprone in treatment B. In no-choice trials (only one source available per trial), the latency to respond was longer in the variable than in the constant source in treatment A and the opposite in treatment B. The greater preference for variability in time than for variability in reward amount is not consistent with either maximizing the ratio of expected energy over expected time or the expected ratio of energy over time for individual trials. There was a negative correlation between individual intake rate and degree of risk proneness for both kinds of variability. We present a model of choice based on an information-processing theory for temporal memory that accounts for the different effects of variability in delay and in amount but cannot explain the effects of intake rate. [Behav Ecol 1991;2:301–308]


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