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Science 4 June 1999:
Vol. 284. no. 5420, p. 1585
DOI: 10.1126/science.284.5420.1585h
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This Week in Science

The posting of sentinels by groups in danger is a feature of human societies. In some animal societies, too, individuals take turns to watch for predators from raised positions, an apparently selfless behavior that has long been explained by kin selection or by reciprocal altruism. Recently, however, this selflessness was called into question by a model that suggested that sentinel behavior could arise from selfish antipredator motives. Clutton-Brock et al. (p. 1640; see the cover and the Perspective by Blumstein) have experimentally tested and confirmed six predictions of this explanation of guarding in suricates (meerkats). In this highly social and cooperative mammal, sentinel behavior is explained by an individual's nutritional state: guarding is the optimal activity once it has a full stomach.




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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)