DOI: 10.5061/dryad.hx3ffbgnr
title: Data from: A social learning primacy trend in mate-copying; an experiment in Drosophila melanogaster

description: Social learning is learning from the observation of how others interact
 with the environment. However, in nature, individuals often need to
 process serial social information and may either favour the most recent
 information (recency bias), constantly updating knowledge to match the
 environment, or the information that appeared first in the series (primacy
 bias), which may slow down adjustment to environmental change.
 Mate-copying is a widespread form of social learning in a mate choice
 context related to conformity in mate choice, and where a naïve individual
 develops a preference for a given mate (or mate phenotype) seen being
 chosen by conspecifics. Mate-copying is documented in most vertebrate taxa
 and in the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. Here, we tested
 experimentally whether female fruit flies show a primacy or a recency bias
 by presenting pictures of a female copulating with one of two
 contrastingly coloured male phenotypes. We found that after two sequential
 contradictory demonstrations, females show a tendency to prefer males of
 the phenotype preferred in the first demonstration, suggesting that
 mate-copying in D. melanogaster is not based on the most recently observed
 mating and may be influenced by a form of primacy bias.
description: A mate-copying experiment in <em>D. melanogaster</em>
 consists of two distinct phases. First, a demonstration phase where the
 observer female can acquire social information from demonstrators,
 followed by a mate choice test of the observer. We used the same set-up as
 previous studies. It was made of two adjacent plastic tubes (0.8 cm x× 3
 cm each) that wasere plugged on one side with cotton, and on the other by
 a microscopy cover slide (1.6 cm x× 1.6 cm) that served as a window from
 which the observer female could watch the demonstration. Another similar
 glass partition was placed between the two tubes, separating them. The
 observer female was placed in the tube adjacent to the side of the
 demonstration. Demonstrations consisted inof one life-sized picture of a
 female mating with one of the coloured males with a male of the other
 colour standing by, as previously done by Nöbel <em>et
 al</em>.. Pictures were approximately 0.5 cm from the focal female
 tube. We used 26 different pictures to reduce pseudo-replication, and we
 found that the picture ID did not explain the variation in our data. Each
 trial consisted of two 30 minute demonstrations in two successive slots
 followed by a mate choice test. Demonstrations were followed by a 15
 minute resting time during which the observer female remained in the
 experimental device. Treatments consisted of a main treatment and two
 controls and ended with a 30 minute mate choice test, where the observer
 female had the choice between a pink and a green living male. These males
 were initially added to the tube separated by the glass partition after
 the demonstrations were finished, which was removed at the start of the
 mate choice test. The main treatment consisted of two
 sequential demonstrations providing conflicting social information (i.e.,
 the demonstrator female copulated with the male of one colour in the first
 demonstration and with the male of the other colour in the second. To
 control for the time gap between each demonstration and the mate choice
 test, we replicated that protocol in the controls but provided no visual
 stimulus in the second (“‘Control 1”’) or first demonstration (“‘Control
 2”’). These controls also tested whether flies were learning socially with
 the current protocol.
description: # Data from: A social learning primacy trend in mate-copying; an
 experiment in Drosophila melanogaster
 [https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.hx3ffbgnr](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.hx3ffbgnr) For more details: Please contact Ricardo Santiago Araujo and Guillaume Isabel for any queries: [guillaume.isabel@univ-tlse3.fr](mailto:guillaume.isabel@univ-tlse3.fr) ## Description The dataset consists of a simple table with 13 column headers: * **date**: The date in which the trial took place in YYYY-MM-DD format * **device**: A numerical ID for the experimental device used for the trial. There is an unique ID for every device, and each device can be used multiple times. Missing or uncertain ID's are marked with a "?", as these were recovered from video footage and were sometimes difficult to read/obstructed. See article for more details. * **treatment**: T (Treatment - 2 contradictory demonstrations); C1 (Control 1: 1 early demonstration); C2 (Control 2: 1 late demonstration). See article for more details about each treatment. * **temperature**: Room temperature in Celcius measured at the start of the demonstrations.  NA: temperature was not registered for the trial * **humidity**: Room humidity in % measured at the start of the demonstrations. NA: humidity was not registered for the trial. * **pressure_hpa**: Atmospheric pressured in hPascal measured in a nearby weather station (Blagnac) as reported at the start of the demonstrations. NA: pressure was not registered for the trial. * **demo_color_1**: Color of the chosen male in picture used during the first demonstration, when applicable (T and C1) (See article for details).  p: pink; g: green; NA: not applicable (no courtship shown in first demonstration period)  * **demo_color_2**: Color of the chosen male in picture used during the second demonstration, when applicable (T and C2) (See article for details).  p: pink; g: green; NA: not applicable (no courtship shown in second demonstration period)  * **which_control**: Identical to "treatment" column. * **color_court_1**: Color of the first male to court the female during the mate-choice trial (if any).  p: pink; g: green; NA: not applicable (no first courtship)  * **color_court_2**: Color of the second male to court the female during the mate-choice trial (if any).  p: pink; g: green; NA: not applicable (no second courtship)  * **test_color:** Color of the male chosen by the female during the mate-choice trial (if any).  p: pink; g: green; NA: not applicable (no male chosen during test)  * **copy_dc_binary**: binary value: 1 (female chose a male of the same color as that of the second/only demonstration AFTER a double courtship) or 0 (all other scenarios). See article for more details.