Shannon Rhey Butler

• Purdue University West Lafayette

A central assumption in behavioral research is that the observer knows where an animal is looking; however, establishing when an animal is gazing (i.e., visually fixating on an object) has been challenging in species with laterally placed eyes. We quantitatively tested three fixation strategies proposed in the literature for birds, using European s...

Head movements allow birds with laterally placed eyes to move their centers of acute vision around and align them with objects of interest. Consequently, head movements have been used as indicator of fixation behavior (where gaze is maintained). However, studies on head movement behavior have not elucidated the degree to which birds use high-acuity...

Pictures of: a) stuffed cat example 1, b) stuffed cat example 2, c) stuffed conspecific, d) taxidermy Cooper’s hawk, e) close up of stuffed conspecific. (TIF)

Video of starlings in presence of stuffed cat. (MP4)

Video of starlings in presence of a stuffed conspecific. (MP4)

Video of starlings in presence of a taxidermy hawk. (MP4)

Data butler plosONE.xlsx. (XLSX)

Many bird species are capable of large saccadic eye movements that can result in substantial shifts in gaze direction and complex changes to their visual field orientation. In the absence of visual stimuli, birds make spontaneous saccades that follow an endogenous oculomotor strategy. We used new eye tracking technology specialized for small birds...

Looking where others are allocating attention can facilitate social interactions by providing information about objects or locations of interest. We asked whether European starlings follow the orientation behaviour of conspecifics owing to their highly gregarious behaviour. Starlings reoriented their attention to follow that of a robot around a bar...

Animals use vision to gather information about their environment and then use that information to make behavioural decisions that affect fitness. They will often move their heads or eyes to inspect areas of interest with their centres of acute vision, such as foveae, to gather high resolution information about potential mates, predation risks, or o...

Sensitivity to the gaze of other individuals has long been a primary focus in sociocognitive research on humans and other animals. Information about where others are looking may often be of adaptive value in social interactions and predator avoidance, but studies across a range of taxa indicate there are substantial differences in the extent to whi...