For social animals, communication is a key that unlocks the benefits of group living. It’s well known that animals with more complex social lives tend to have more intricate ways of communicating, from the clicks and whistles of dolphins to the calls of primates. While this pattern is found broadly in many species, a new study on wild parrots drills deep into the social and vocal lives of individual birds. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior (MPI-AB) analyzing the social networks of monk parakeets in Spain have uncovered how an individual’s social ties shapes the calls these birds make.

Psychological experiment suggests actively considering the beauty of art increases abstract thinking and “transformative” emotion – helping us escape the “mental trappings” of day-to-day living.

The article published in the journal Party Politics, involving researchers Toni Rodon (UPF), Nikandros Ioannidis (Cyprus University of Technology) and Marc Guinjoan (UAB), offers insight into the dynamics of the winner-loser effects in sovereignty referendums and their effects on elections. The study is based on the CONREF dataset, which includes information on 77 sovereignty referendums held between 1956 and 2020 in 32 countries, as well as the electoral outcomes of the parties –over 500 political formations– before and after the referendum and their policy position in several key areas.