Practice question · Multiple choice
Many threat displays evolved from ordinary movements, a bird's attack posture from the intention movement of taking off. What does ritualization add to the original behaviour?
Hints
- A signal is only useful if the receiver can tell it apart from ordinary behaviour. Ask what change achieves that.
- Compare a bird almost taking off with a bird performing 'about to take off' unmistakably.
Show the answer
B. Exaggeration and stereotypy, so it can be read reliably
Why
The movement is stylised until it can no longer be mistaken for the thing it came from, bigger, fixed in form, often stripped of its original use. That is how a by-product becomes a message, and it is why threat displays look theatrical: legibility is the whole point.
Practise Communication and Ritualization
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