Skip to main content
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences logoLink to Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
. 2004 Nov 22;271(1555):2337–2343. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2004.2844

The disadvantage of combinatorial communication.

Michael Lachmann 1, Carl T Bergstrom 1
PMCID: PMC1691869  PMID: 15556886

Abstract

Combinatorial communication allows rapid and efficient transfer of detailed information, yet combinatorial communication is used by few, if any, non-human species. To complement recent studies illustrating the advantages of combinatorial communication, we highlight a critical disadvantage. We use the concept of information value to show that deception poses a greater and qualitatively different threat to combinatorial signalling than to non-combinatorial systems. This additional potential for deception may represent a strategic barrier that has prevented widespread evolution of combinatorial communication. Our approach has the additional benefit of drawing clear distinctions among several types of deception that can occur in communication systems.

Full Text

The Full Text of this article is available as a PDF (141.8 KB).

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

  1. Bergstrom C. T., Lachmann M. Signaling among relatives. III. Talk is cheap. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1998 Apr 28;95(9):5100–5105. doi: 10.1073/pnas.95.9.5100. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Bergstrom Carl T., Számadó Szabolcs, Lachmann Michael. Separating equilibria in continuous signalling games. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2002 Nov 29;357(1427):1595–1606. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2002.1068. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Lachmann M., Bergstrom C. T. Signalling among relatives. II. Beyond the tower of Babel. Theor Popul Biol. 1998 Oct;54(2):146–160. doi: 10.1006/tpbi.1997.1372. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Nowak M. A., Krakauer D. C. The evolution of language. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1999 Jul 6;96(14):8028–8033. doi: 10.1073/pnas.96.14.8028. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. Nowak M. A., Plotkin J. B., Jansen V. A. The evolution of syntactic communication. Nature. 2000 Mar 30;404(6777):495–498. doi: 10.1038/35006635. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  6. Nowak M. A. The basic reproductive ratio of a word, the maximum size of a lexicon. J Theor Biol. 2000 May 21;204(2):179–189. doi: 10.1006/jtbi.2000.1085. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  7. doi: 10.1098/rstb.1997.0041. [DOI] [PMC free article] [Google Scholar]
  8. Számadó S. Cheating as a mixed strategy in a simple model of aggressive communication. Anim Behav. 2000 Jan;59(1):221–230. doi: 10.1006/anbe.1999.1293. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences are provided here courtesy of The Royal Society

RESOURCES