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Related Concept Videos

Social Traps01:41

Social Traps

Social traps are negative situations where people get caught in a direction or relationship that later proves to be unpleasant, with no easy way to back out of or avoid. The concept was orignally introduced by John Platt who applied psychology to Garrett Hardin's "Tragedy of the Commons", where in New England herd owners could let their cattle graze in the common ground. This situation seems like a good idea, but an individual could have an advantage. If they owned more cows, the larger...
The Anchoring-and-Adjustment Heuristic01:25

The Anchoring-and-Adjustment Heuristic

In order to make good decisions, we use our knowledge and our reasoning. Often, this knowledge and reasoning is sound and solid. However, sometimes, we are swayed by biases or by others manipulating a situation. For example, let’s say you and three friends wanted to rent a house and had a combined target budget of $1,600. The realtor shows you only very run-down houses for $1,600 and then shows you a very nice house for $2,000. Might you ask each person to pay more in rent to get the $2,000...
Habitat Fragmentation02:31

Habitat Fragmentation

Habitat fragmentation describes the division of a more extensive, continuous habitat into smaller, discontinuous areas. Human activities such as land conversion, as well as slower geological processes leading to changes in the physical environment, are the two leading causes of habitat fragmentation. The fragmentation process typically follows the same steps: perforation, dissection, fragmentation, shrinkage, and attrition.
Factors Affecting Perception01:25

Factors Affecting Perception

Perception is influenced by perceptual set, context, motivation, and emotion. Perceptual set, or perceptual expectancy, refers to the tendency to perceive things in a particular way, influenced by previous experiences and expectations. This phenomenon affects the interpretation of stimuli, creating a set of mental tendencies and assumptions that impact sensory perceptions of sound, taste, touch, and sight.
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Confirmation Biases01:31

Confirmation Biases

The confirmation bias is the tendency to focus on information that confirms our existing beliefs and ignore information that is inconsistent with our expectations. For example, if you think that your professor is not very nice, you notice all of the instances of rude behavior exhibited by the professor while ignoring the countless pleasant interactions he is involved in on a daily basis. Have you ever fallen prey to the confirmation bias, either as the source or target of such bias?
Perceptual Constancy01:12

Perceptual Constancy

Perceptual constancy is the ability to recognize that objects remain consistent and unchanged even when their appearance varies due to changes in sensory input. There are four main types of perceptual constancy: size constancy, shape constancy, color constancy, and brightness constancy.
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Integrating Visual Psychophysical Assays within a Y-Maze to Isolate the Role that Visual Features Play in Navigational Decisions
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Habitat selection and the perceptual trap.

Michael A Patten1, Jeffrey F Kelly

  • 1Oklahoma Biological Survey and Department of Zoology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma 73019, USA. mpatten@ou.edu

Ecological Applications : a Publication of the Ecological Society of America
|January 27, 2011
PubMed
Summary

Ecological traps lure animals to low-quality habitats. A new concept, perceptual traps, describes animals avoiding high-quality habitats, potentially limiting populations more severely.

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Area of Science:

  • Ecology
  • Animal Behavior

Background:

  • Ecological traps occur when animals are attracted to low-quality habitats, reducing fitness.
  • Research on ecological traps has increased, but the converse, perceptual traps, remains underexplored.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To introduce and explore the concept of perceptual traps.
  • To investigate the potential prevalence and impact of perceptual traps on population persistence.

Main Methods:

  • Literature review and conceptualization of perceptual traps.
  • Analysis of existing ecological studies and introduction of field experiments with the Lesser Prairie-Chicken (Tympanuchus pallidicinctus).

Main Results:

  • Perceptual traps, where high-quality habitat is avoided due to lower attractiveness, can be more detrimental to populations than ecological traps.
  • Field experiments with the Lesser Prairie-Chicken provide empirical support for the perceptual trap concept.
  • Potential examples suggest perceptual traps may be more common than previously thought.

Conclusions:

  • Perceptual traps can persist even with high fitness due to demographic Allee effects.
  • Unlike ecological traps, negating perceptual traps is challenging and requires identifying and enhancing habitat-selection cues.