Deceived by stripes: conspicuous patterning on vital anterior body parts can redirect predatory strikes to expendable posterior organs

Conspicuous colouration, which presumably makes prey more visible to predators, has intrigued researchers for long. Contrastingly coloured, conspicuous striped patterns are common among lizards and other animals, but their function is unknown. We propose and test a novel hypothesis, the 'redirection hypothesis', wherein longitudinal striped patterns, such as those found on the anterior body parts of most lacertilians, redirect attacks away from themselves during motion towards less vulnerable posterior parts, for e.g. the autotomous tail. In experiments employing human 'predators’ attacking virtual prey on a touchscreen, we show that longitudinal striped patterns on the anterior half of prey decreased attacks to the anterior, and increased attacks to the posterior. The position of stripes mattered – they worked best when they were at the anterior. By employing an adaptive psychophysical procedure, we show that prey with striped patterning are perceived to move slower, offering a mechani...

那些本会使猎物更易被捕食者察觉的醒目体色，长期以来一直为研究者所关注。对比鲜明的醒目条纹模式在蜥蜴及其他动物中颇为常见，但其具体功能尚未明确。我们提出并验证了一项全新假说——‘转向假说’：多数蜥蜴类动物躯体前部的纵向条纹模式，可在运动过程中将捕食者的攻击从自身转移至防御性更强的后部躯体，例如具备自断能力的尾部。在以人类作为‘捕食者’、在触摸屏上攻击虚拟猎物的实验中，我们发现猎物前半身的纵向条纹会减少针对前部的攻击，同时增加针对后部的攻击。条纹的位置至关重要——当其位于躯体前部时，防御效果最佳。通过自适应心理物理学实验范式，我们发现带有条纹图案的猎物会被感知为移动速度更慢，这为其防御机制提供了一种...