Colourful network: Pair-bonding temporal dynamics involve sexual signals and impact reproduction

Mate choice and pair-bonding are the products of complex decisions involving repeated social interactions over time. They generally rely on multiple sexual signals and behaviours, depend on the phenotype and experiences of the chooser and are affected by environmental conditions and competition for mate access. However, studies investigating the mechanisms of mate selection often ignore the dynamic aspects of the pair formation. In the current study, we used social network analyses to (1) describe sexual interactions over time in multiple groups of captive zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata), (2) ask how individual sexual signals and body condition relate to pair-bonding temporal dynamics and (3) investigate whether sexual networks influence assortative mating and reproductive performance. We followed sexual interactions of 8 sex-balanced groups of 8 individuals to extract social network metrics over 8 sessions of observation. We assessed individual body condition, sexual signals and co..., , , # Data from: Colourful network: Pair-bonding temporal dynamics involve sexual signals and impact reproduction

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.0rxwdbsb5](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.0rxwdbsb5)

## Description of the data and file structure

The data were collected on 64 adult zebra finches (*Taeniopygia guttata*) in 2022 (between March and October) at the Centre d’Etudes Biologiques de Chizé (CNRS) in France.

Data from the file MSBE_Socialinteraction.csv was collected using a group-level scan sampling method to record the sexual behaviour of all individuals within each group (8 groups of 8 individuals in total). We conducted two 20 min observation sessions per group each day, from the release of the birds until pair formations were observed, or after eight sessions of observation (i.e. 4 days). We noted the ID of birds expressing one of the three types of sexual interactions: male song (i.e. singing directed song toward the partner), allopreening (grooming/preening the feather of the...