How cognitive and environmental constraints influence the reliability of simulated animats in groups

PLoS One. 2020 Feb 7;15(2):e0228879. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0228879. eCollection 2020.

Abstract

Evolving in groups can either enhance or reduce an individual's task performance. Still, we know little about the factors underlying group performance, which may be reduced to three major dimensions: (a) the individual's ability to perform a task, (b) the dependency on environmental conditions, and (c) the perception of, and the reaction to, other group members. In our research, we investigated how these dimensions interrelate in simulated evolution experiments using adaptive agents equipped with Markov brains ("animats"). We evolved the animats to perform a spatial-navigation task under various evolutionary setups. The last generation of each evolution simulation was tested across modified conditions to evaluate and compare the animats' reliability when faced with change. Moreover, the complexity of the evolved Markov brains was assessed based on measures of information integration. We found that, under the right conditions, specialized animats could be as reliable as animats already evolved for the modified tasks, and that reliability across varying group sizes correlated with evolved fitness in most tested evolutionary setups. Our results moreover suggest that balancing the number of individuals in a group may lead to higher reliability but also lower individual performance. Besides, high brain complexity was associated with balanced group sizes and, thus, high reliability under limited sensory capacity. However, additional sensors allowed for even higher reliability across modified environments without a need for complex, integrated Markov brains. Despite complex dependencies between the individual, the group, and the environment, our computational approach provides a way to study reliability in group behavior under controlled conditions. In all, our study revealed that balancing the group size and individual cognitive abilities prevents over-specialization and can help to evolve better reliability under unknown environmental situations.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Biological Evolution*
  • Brain / physiology
  • Cognition*
  • Computer Simulation*
  • Environment
  • Genetic Fitness
  • Humans
  • Intelligence
  • Markov Chains
  • Memory
  • Models, Biological
  • Population Density
  • Social Environment
  • Task Performance and Analysis

Grants and funding

This project was made possible through the support of a grant from Templeton World Charity Foundation, Inc. (#TWCF0196) received by L.A.. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Templeton World Charity Foundation, Inc. In addition, L.A. was supported by the Tiny Blue Dot Foundation (UW 133AAG3451). https://www.templetonworldcharity.org. D.F. receives funding from the "Digitaler Campus Bayern" (Kap. 15 06 TG 98) Fund of the Free State of Bavaria, Germany. https://www.stmwk.bayern.de/studenten/digitalisierung/hochschule-digitaler-campus.html. S.M. does not receive specific funding, which supported this work. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Other authors receive no specific funding for this work.