DPhil. Student

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Ella Cole

Ella Cole

Details

Name: Ella Cole
Position: DPhil. Student
Email: eleanor.Cole@zoo.ox.ac.uk

Autobiography

I graduated from Oxford University in 2007 with a BA in Biological Sciences. During the last two years of my degree I concentrated on animal and environmental biology and became particularly interested in the variation, and plasticity, of life history traits and behaviours exhibited by birds. Over the last three summers I have accumulated fieldwork experience studying the ecology of the spectral tarsier Tarsius spectrum in southeast Sulawesi, Indonesia, beginning as a general research assistant and progressing to assistant tarsier scientist. In October 2007 I began to read for a DPhil at Oxford under the supervision of Dr John Quinn and Prof. Alex Kacelnik.

Research Activities

The aim of my DPhil is to explore the causes of individual variation in problem solving ability amongst great tits Parus major. Pilot studies have shown that there is significant variation in problem solving performance in great tits, and it may be the case that this is partly due to genetic variation within populations. My project aims to investigate both the proximate and ultimate causes of variation in problem solving performance, and therefore how, and why this variation exists within wild great tit populations. As well as considering the genetic component to this variation, I am very interested in investigating the extent to which variation in problem solving performance is due to variation in motivation, learning performance and personality traits. My project also aims to compare the problem solving performance of great tits with that of New Caledonian crows Corvus moneduloides, a species that has received much attention for its sophisticated ability to make and use tools.

Selected Recent Papers

Cole,E.F. & Quinn, J.L. Personality and innovativeness explain individual variation in competitive ability in the wild. Proceedings of the Royal Society London B (in press).

Dunn, J.C., Cole, E.F. and Quinn, J.L. 2011. Personality and parasites: Sex-dependent associations between avian malaria infection and multiple behavioural traits. Behavioral Ecology & Sociobiology (in press).

Quinn, J.L, Cole, E.F. Patrick, S. and Sheldon, B.C. 2011. Scale and state-dependence of the relationship between personality and dispersal in a great tit population. Journal of Animal Ecology (in press).

Cole, E.F., Cram. D., and Quinn, J.L. 2011. Individual variation in spontaneous problem-solving performance among wild great tits. Animal Behaviour 81: 491-498. | Read abstract/paper online