The onus on the average person is greater than ever before to make sense of large amounts
of readily accessible quantitative information, but the ability and confidence to do so are …

Foraging is risk sensitive if choices depend on the variability of returns from the options as
well as their mean return. Risk‐sensitive foraging is important in behavioural ecology …

Insects can be very good learners. For example, they can form associations between a cue
and a reward after only one exposure. Discrimination learning, in which multiple cues are …

Behavioural economists have identified many psychological manipulations which affect
perceived value. A prominent example of this is bundling, in which several small gains (or …

Animals may gather information from multiple sources, and these information sources may
conflict. Theory predicts that, all else being equal, reliance on a particular information source …

Highlights•We undertake a review of collective animal behaviour using Tinbergen's four
questions.•We thus identify a lack of optimality theory in collective animal behaviour.•We …

Humans usually assess options not in terms of absolute value, but relative to reference
points. The framing of alternatives can strongly affect human decision-making, leading to …

The marginal value theorem (MVT) predicts that optimal foragers leave a patch when the
instantaneous gain rate decreases to the average long-term gain rate. However, various …

Many ants establish foraging routes through learning views of the visual panorama. Route
models have focused primarily on attractive view use, which experienced foragers orient …

Comparing the value of options is at the heart of economic decision-making. While an option
may have an absolute quality (eg a food source has a fixed energy content), the perceived …