For vibrationally-communicating species, many interactions involve locating the source of a substrate-borne vibration. In the insects we primarily work with (membracid treehoppers), mating involves duets between mobile males that home in on the signals of stationary females; maternal care involves locating a predator based on information provided by offspring signals; and recruitment to a new feeding site in group-living species involves signaling by scouts that find a new site, followed by convergence on that site by the rest of the group. Given the centrality of localization to membracid social behavior (and that of many other vibrationally-communicating organisms), we study the mechanisms by which individuals find the source of a substrate vibration.
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Publications:
Cocroft, RB, Hill, P, Wessel, A & Gogala, M, editors. In press. Studying vibrational communication. Springer, Berlin.
Cocroft, RB, Gogala,M, Hill, PSM & Wessel, A. In press. Fostering research progress in a rapidly growing field. In: Cocroft et al. (eds), Studying Vibrational Communication, Springer, Berlin.
Cocroft, RB, Hamel, JA, Su, Q & Gibson, JS. In press. Vibrational playback experiments: challenges and solutions. In: Cocroft et al. (eds), Studying Vibrational Communication, Springer, Berlin.
Cocroft, RB. 2011. The public world of insect vibrational communication. Molecular Ecology 20: 2041-2043. (pdf)
McNett GD, Luan L & Cocroft RB. 2010. Wind-induced noise alters signaler and receiver behavior in vibrational communication. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 64:2043–2051. (pdf)
Cocroft, RB. 2010. Vibrational Communication. In: Breed, M & Moore, J Encyclopedia of Animal Behavior (Elsevier, online). (pdf)
McNett, GD & Cocroft, RB. 2008. Host shifts favor vibrational signal divergence in Enchenopa binotata treehoppers. Behavioral Ecology 19:650-656. (pdf)
McNett, GD, Miles, RN, Homentcovschi, D & Cocroft, RB. 2006. A method for two-dimensional characterization of animal vibrational signals transmitted along plant stems. Journal of Comparative Physiology A 192:1245-1251. (pdf)
Cocroft, RB, Shugart, HJ, Konrad, KT & Tibbs, K. 2006. Variation in plant substrates and its consequences for insect vibrational communication. Ethology 112:779-789. (pdf)
Cocroft, RB & De Luca, PA. 2006. Size-frequency relationships in insect vibrational signals. Pp. 99-110 in Insect Sounds and Communication: Physiology, Ecology and Evolution (eds. Claridge, MF & Drosopoulos, S). Taylor & Francis, Boca Raton, FL. (pdf)
Cocroft, RB & McNett, GD. 2006. Vibrational communication in treehoppers (Hemiptera: Membracidae). Pp. 305-317 in Insect Sounds and Communication: Physiology, Ecology and Evolution (eds. Claridge, MF & Drosopoulos, S). Taylor & Francis, Boca Raton, FL. (pdf)
Cocroft, RB & Rodríguez, RL. 2005. The behavioral ecology of insect vibrational communication. BioScience 55:323-334. (pdf)
Cocroft, RB. 2003. The social environment of an aggregating, ant-attended treehopper. Journal of Insect Behavior 16:79-95. (pdf)
Miles, RN, Cocroft, RB, Gibbons, C and Batt, D. 2001. A bending wave simulator for investigating directional vibration sensing in insects. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 110:579-587. (pdf)
Cocroft, RB, Tieu, T, Hoy, RR & Miles, R. 2000. Mechanical directionality in the response to substrate vibration in a treehopper. Journal of Comparative Physiology 186: 695-705. (pdf)
Cocroft, RB. 1999. Thornbug to thornbug: the inside story of insect song. Natural History 108:52-57. (HTML)
Barnett, K, Cocroft, RB & Fleishman, L. 1999. Possible communication by substrate vibration in a chameleon. Copeia 1999:225-228. (pdf)
de Vries, PJ, Cocroft, RB & Thomas, J. 1993. Comparison of acoustical signals in Maculinea butterfly caterpillars and their obligate host Myrmica ants. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 49:229-238. (pdf)