Data from: Selection for collective aggressiveness favors social susceptibility in social spiders

Particularly socially influential individuals are present in many groups, but it is unclear whether their emergence is determined by their social influence versus the social susceptibility of others. The social spider Stegodyphus dumicola shows regional variation in apparent leader-follower dynamics. We use this variation to evaluate the relative contributions of leader social influence versus follower social susceptibility in driving this social order. Using chimeric colonies that combine potential leaders and followers, we discover that leader-follower dynamics emerge from the site-specific social susceptibility of followers. We further show that the presence of leaders increases colony survival in environments where leader-follower dynamics occur. Thus, leadership is driven by the “social susceptibility” of the population majority, rather than the social influence of key group members.

诸多群体中均存在具备显著社会影响力的个体，但目前尚不明确这类个体的出现究竟是由其自身的社会影响力决定，还是受其他个体的社会易感倾向（social susceptibility）所调控。社交蜘蛛杜氏裂面蛛（Stegodyphus dumicola）的表观领袖-追随者动态模式存在区域差异。本研究借助这一区域差异，评估了领袖社会影响力与追随者社会易感倾向在驱动该社交秩序形成过程中的相对贡献。通过构建融合潜在领袖与追随者的嵌合种群（chimeric colonies），本研究发现，领袖-追随者的动态模式源于追随者的位点特异性社会易感倾向。进一步研究表明，在存在领袖-追随者动态模式的环境中，领袖的存在可提升种群的存活率。由此可见，群体的领袖地位并非由核心成员的社会影响力所决定，而是源于种群多数个体的社会易感倾向（social susceptibility）。