Data from: How social network structure affects decision-making in Drosophila melanogaster

Animals use a number of different mechanisms to acquire crucial
information. During social encounters animals can pass information from
one to another but, ideally, they would only use information that benefits
survival and reproduction. Therefore, individuals need to be able to
determine the value of the information they receive. One cue can come from
the behaviour of other individuals that are already using the information.
Here we study how individual decision-making is influenced by the
behaviour of conspecifics in Drosophila melanogaster. We analysed how
uninformed flies acquire and later use information about oviposition site
choice they learn from informed flies. Interestingly, after social
interaction, uninformed flies tended either to collectively follow the
choice of the informed flies or to avoid it. Using social network
analysis, we show that this discriminating decision-making process seems
to be based on the level of homogeneity of the social network. Uninformed
flies were not influenced by how frequently they observed a behaviour in
informed peers; rather, they chose to follow the information they acquired
from informed flies that exhibited the behaviour consistently. More
generally, further examination of a previous extended dataset confirmed
the evidence that the information informed individuals transmit through
their behaviour can either encourage or discourage specific oviposition
site preference in uninformed peers, and we demonstrate the main role of
social network structure on the learning process.