- BERG - University of Stirling Mailing Lists

No BERG tonight
by Kristin Descovich 18 Mar '15

18 Mar '15

Dear BERGers, Unfortunately our speaker for tonight is unable to make it. However, this is for very good reasons as the female giant panda has come into season unexpectedly. As you can imagine, this is a significant event that happens only once a year for a very short time and therefore Iain Valentine is in the midst of preparations regarding this. We look forward to welcoming him some time in the near future. My apologies for any inconvenience, Kind Regards, Kris

1 0

Giant Pandas at BERG
by Kristin Descovich 16 Mar '15

16 Mar '15

Dear BERGers, This Wednesday we will have a very interesting guest from the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland. Iain Valentine is the Director of the Giant Panda Project at Edinburgh Zoo and he will be visiting us to present on this topic: "Giant pandas at the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland". As usual, we will meet in room 3A94 (Psychology common room) at 5:30pm, and will have drinks and nibbles available. For details on upcoming BERG seminars please visit: www.stir.ac.uk/natural-sciences/research/seminars/psychology/berg-seminars. I hope to see you all on Wednesday night! Kris Dr Kris Descovich Research Fellow in Animal Welfare Psychology, School of Natural Sciences University of Stirling Stirling, FK9 4LA Scotland Tel: 01786 467643 E-mail: kristin.descovich(a)stir.ac.uk<mailto:kristin.descovich@stir.ac.uk> Behaviour and Evolution Research Group (BERG) seminar programme: http://www.stir.ac.uk/natural-sciences/research/seminars/psychology/berg-se…

1 0

Global explosion of infrastructure
by Hannah Buchanan-Smith 13 Mar '15

13 Mar '15

Some shocking facts about destruction but the good news is the fight back. I have the article if anyone wishes a copy. Best, Hannah ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Laurance, Bill <bill.laurance(a)jcu.edu.au<mailto:bill.laurance@jcu.edu.au>> Date: 13 March 2015 at 10:15 Subject: Global explosion of infrastructure To: "Laurance, Bill" <bill.laurance(a)jcu.edu.au<mailto:bill.laurance@jcu.edu.au>> Dear colleagues, I'd like to draw your attention to our article that has just appeared online in Current Biology—see attached. This is being used as a springboard for a major effort by scores of eminent scientists and luminaries to lobby the leaders of the G20 nations to rethink their astonishing plans to more than double total global investment in roads, hydroelectric dams, power lines, gas lines, mining, fossil-fuel projects, and other major infrastructure over the next 15 years. See also these brief, popular synopses, which provide a nice snapshot of our main findings: https://theconversation.com/roads-to-ruin-the-pitfalls-of-the-g20s-infrastr… http://alert-conservation.org/issues-research-highlights/2015/3/8/alert-sci… Apologies for any cross-postings. Please do forward to interested friends and colleagues! All best, Bill William F. Laurance, FAAAS Distinguished Research Professor & Australian Laureate Prince Bernhard Chair in International Nature Conservation Director of the Centre for Tropical Environmental and Sustainability Science (TESS) [cid:44C4EC78-A517-4CA5-834E-ED6D51BCFB7B] Director of ALERT (ALERT-conservation.org) [cid:19A88B51-0715-435E-AB56-D9B8C373A8C0] Centre for Tropical Environmental and Sustainability Science (TESS) & College of Marine and Environmental Sciences James Cook University Cairns, Queensland 4878, Australia Phones: +61-7-4038-1518<tel:%2B61-7-4038-1518> and +61-7-4232-1819<tel:%2B61-7-4232-1819> Email: bill.laurance(a)jcu.edu.au<mailto:bill.laurance@jcu.edu.au> Lab website: http://laurancelab.org/ Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_F_Laurance

1 0

FW: SCAB 2015 Talk Deadline
by Hannah Buchanan-Smith 12 Mar '15

12 Mar '15

Still time to offer a talk! From: Scab The Conference [mailto:scab.the.conference@gmail.com] Sent: 12 March 2015 16:44 To: Axel Wiberg Subject: SCAB 2015 Talk Deadline Hi All, The deadline for registering your talk at SCAB 2015 is tomorrow! There are still places left and we're looking for more speakers. Pass the news on to all your friends and colleagues. Register your talk here: http://onlineshop.st-andrews.ac.uk/browse/extra_info.asp?compid=1&modid=1&c… Once again, I've attached a skeleton form of the programme for the day. Talks will be allocated 15 minutes including question as at previous conferences. General attendees and poster registrations will be accepted for longer. We would also like to make a call for anyone willing to be a judge for the poster and talk competitions to come forward. Looking forward to seeing you all soon! Best wishes, The SCAB team

1 0

Celebrations for Dr Ash to be
by Hannah Buchanan-Smith 11 Mar '15

11 Mar '15

Hayley passed her viva with minor corrections - celebrations in the common room now. Check out: New methods for monitoring and improving welfare of laboratory dogs<http://www.bbsrc.ac.uk/news/policy/2014/140918-n-animal-welfate-laboratory-…> Hannah M. Buchanan-Smith Professor, Behaviour and Evolution Research Group Director of Learning and Teaching in SNS Psychology, School of Natural Sciences University of Stirling Stirling, FK9 4LA Scotland Tel: 01786 467674 Fax: 01786 467641 E-mail: h.m.buchanan-smith(a)stir.ac.uk<mailto:h.m.buchanan-smith@stir.ac.uk> Home page: https://rms.stir.ac.uk/converis-stirling/person/11925 http://marmosetcare.com/

2 1

Thursday's Division Seminar
by Kristin Descovich 09 Mar '15

09 Mar '15

Dear BERGers, I hope you all had a productive / relaxing time over the Reading break. This Wednesday we will not have a BERG meeting, as there is a BERG related speaker presenting the Psychology Division seminar on Thursday and we would like to encourage everyone to come along, particularly those interested in human-animal interaction. The speaker will be Dr Jo Williams from the University of Edinburgh, who will be presenting: "Promoting positive interactions between children and animals." The event will be held in room 3A94 (Psychology common room) at 4pm on Thursday the 3rd of March, and a poster is attached. Please pass this on to any other people who may be interested in attending. Kind Regards, Kris Dr Kris Descovich Research Fellow in Animal Welfare Psychology, School of Natural Sciences University of Stirling Stirling, FK9 4LA Scotland Tel: 01786 467643 E-mail: kristin.descovich(a)stir.ac.uk<mailto:kristin.descovich@stir.ac.uk> Behaviour and Evolution Research Group (BERG) seminar programme: http://www.stir.ac.uk/natural-sciences/research/seminars/psychology/berg-se…

1 1

Calling all Animal Behaviour Scientists
by Hannah Buchanan-Smith 03 Mar '15

03 Mar '15

Do you research animal cognition and behaviour? Do you love what you do? Then why not tell visitors at RZSS - Edinburgh Zoo how cool it is? The Living Links Public Engagement Prize is a new competition aimed at animal behaviour researchers. It is being run as part of our 'Animal Cultures' event in the Edinburgh International Science Festival. Further details see here - note deadline 27th March. http://www.living-links.org/calling-all-animal-behaviour-scientists/ Hannah Check out: New methods for monitoring and improving welfare of laboratory dogs<http://www.bbsrc.ac.uk/news/policy/2014/140918-n-animal-welfate-laboratory-…> Hannah M. Buchanan-Smith Professor, Behaviour and Evolution Research Group Director of Learning and Teaching in SNS Psychology, School of Natural Sciences University of Stirling Stirling, FK9 4LA Scotland Tel: 01786 467674 Fax: 01786 467641 E-mail: h.m.buchanan-smith(a)stir.ac.uk<mailto:h.m.buchanan-smith@stir.ac.uk> Home page: https://rms.stir.ac.uk/converis-stirling/person/11925 http://marmosetcare.com/

1 0

SCAB 2015
by Hannah Buchanan-Smith 24 Feb '15

24 Feb '15

Dear BERGers Please find attached details of this year’s Scottish Conference on Animal Behaviour (SCAB) on Saturday 28th March in St. Andrews. I very much hope that there will be good Stirling attendance – speakers and audience. ABSTRACT SUBMISSION CLOSES ON 13th MARCH. All details below/on website/facebook page. Best, Hannah From: Scab The Conference [mailto:scab.the.conference@gmail.com] Sent: 20 February 2015 13:41 To: Axel Wiberg Subject: SCAB 2015 Dear SCAB Attendee, You're receiving this e-mail because you were on a mailing list for last year's SCAB conference in Edinburgh. Hopefully you will have heard recently about the upcoming SCAB 2015 in St Andrews. We have finally come to a stage where we can start collecting registrations and talk/poster submissions for the upcoming conference at the the end of March (Saturday 28th). Registration for conferences here at St Andrews is required to go through our Online Shop service. I would therefore direct your attention to the link below where you will be able to pay the registration fee and submit abstracts and titles for your talks. You can also enter dietary information and other essentials. SCAB website here<http://onlineshop.st-andrews.ac.uk/browse/extra_info.asp?compid=1&modid=1&d…> You can keep up to date with further developments on Facebook as well, search for "SCAB 2015" I've also been contacted by Mike Hansell who is compiling a history of the SCAB meetings. He informs me that the first meeting was held in 1976 here in St Andrews. He has asked me to include a call for information from attendees who are willing to contribute. "SCAB is Forty but has no history! You can help find it. The first meeting of SCAB was in the University of St Andrews in 1976; so this year’s meeting on 28th March in St Andrews is a historic event. The problem is that SCAB has no history. The great success of SCAB has been the opportunity it has given to younger researchers to present their work in a critical yet informal environment. It has also given valuable experience to conference organisers, its informal arrangements allowing the meeting to pass annually from one University to the next on a ‘your turn I think’ basis. It travels light, leaving its history behind it. But, I believe that history is important and I am now trying to rescue what I can of it. I plan to lodge this information in the Archive of the University of Glasgow and I am now asking you if you can provide information that will fill in gaps that currently exist in my record on where the meetings were held, the programme of speakers and posters and the Conference organisers. I will be contacting you directly towards the end of February with further details of the aim of this project and also a spreadsheet showing what I currently know and do not know of past meetings. Please look at these two items and contact me with any information you think might help. SCAB needs a history! Mike Hansell IBAHCM, University of Glasgow, G12 8QQ Mike.Hansell(a)glasgow.ac.uk<mailto:Mike.Hansell@glasgow.ac.uk>" Please forward this message on to any of your colleagues and friends who would be interested in attending or giving a talk at SCAB. I've also attached a conference poster to this e-mail and I would be grateful if you could put it up in your departments (if one is not already up) to advertise the event. Should you have any further questions you can reply to this e-mail or write directly to raww(a)st-andrews.ac.uk<mailto:raww@st-andrews.ac.uk> or evg(a)st-andrews.ac.uk<mailto:evg@st-andrews.ac.uk> We're looking forward to seeing you all here in St Andrews soon, Best wishes, The SCAB Team

1 0

FW: Monday seminar - Public attitudes and involvement, conservation conflicts, and science-policy interfaces
by Hannah Buchanan-Smith 18 Feb '15

18 Feb '15

This looks like an interesting seminar..... --------------- The seminar on Monday (23rd Feb) will be by Juliette Young (CEH, Edinburgh)..... 12 noon in A6 (Cottrell building). Juliette has been leading on some really interesting interdisciplinary work and has on-going collaborations with folk in BES. Title: Public attitudes and involvement, conservation conflicts, and science-policy interfaces Summary: This presentation will provide a whistle-stop tour of some of the interdisciplinary research we carry out at CEH Edinburgh. Topics covered will include: assessing public understanding of biodiversity and its management in Scotland; exploring stakeholder involvement in Natura 2000; managing, mapping and resolving conservation conflicts; developing effective science-policy interfaces, including an update on the IPBES. Bio: I have been working at CEH since 2002. Although I started my career as a zoologist, I have since become a mix of natural and social scientist, having done a PhD in social sciences. Most of my work now focusses on the political dimension of biodiversity conservation, with a focus on protected areas, science-policy-society dialogue and conflicts.

1 0

Josep Call talk in Edinburgh - 24 Feb
by Hannah Buchanan-Smith 16 Feb '15

16 Feb '15

Tuesday, 24 February 12.30noon – LUNCHTIME TALK Chrystal MacMillan Building - Seminar Room 2 Josep Call, Max Planck Insitute of Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig & School of Psychology and Neuroscience, University of St Andrews http://www.eva.mpg.de/psycho/staff/call/ "Apes as intuitive statisticians" Abstract Numerous animal species are capable of selecting the larger of two quantities even when those are presented concurrently and fall outside either object file or subitizing range. Much less is known about animals’ ability to spontaneously estimate probabilities, an ability that should be distinguished from sensitivity to reinforcement probabilities. In this talk I will present data on how great apes estimate probabilities in tasks that require comparing two probabilities and extrapolating from populations to samples to net the highest possible payoff. These data have implications for several disciplines including comparative cognition, logic, and experimental economics. Host: Alex Weiss

1 0