CASCB talk: The consequences of stress in social groups of birds by Dr. Hanja Brandl

What happens in social groups if some of its members are stressed? As humans, we have all experienced situations where interacting with stressed friends or observing a colleague nervously delivering a presentation has made us feel stressed ourselves. Decades of research in humans have established that the process of stress transmission might be as evolutionarily deeply rooted as the stress response itself, but its function and consequences in animal groups remains almost completely unexplored. Zebra finches are colonial breeders with stable bonds and socially synchronized reproduction that helps them survive and breed in a harsh ecosystem. I explored how experimentally induced mid-term chronic stress affected the dynamics and performance of social groups by impacting body condition, breeding latency and movement patterns of both manipulated and unmanipulated birds. These results reveal the potential of stress transmission for severe consequences in animal collectives.