Chapter 10 Measuring the Dynamics of Mammalian Societies: An Ecologist’s Guide to Ethological Methods Today, biologists interpret behavior within a context fortified by theories of cognition, behavioral evolution, and games, and any or all of four processes may lead to cooperation. | Chapter 10 Measuring the Dynamics of Mammalian Societies An Ecologist s Guide to Ethological Methods David W. Macdonald Paul D. Stewart Pavel Stopka and Nobuyuki Yamaguchi Today biologists interpret behavior within a context fortified by theories of cognition behavioral evolution and games Axelrod 1984 Findlay et al. 1989 Hemelrijk 1990 Hare 1992 de Waal 1992 and any or all of four processes may lead to cooperation kin selection reciprocity and byproduct mutualism and even trait-group selection reviewed by Dugatkin 1997 . The processes that fashion societies are set within an ecological context Macdonald 1983 and a species ecology can scarcely be interpreted without understanding its social life. As the specialties within whole-animal biology diversify and the once close-knit family of behavioral and ecological disciplines risks drifting apart our purpose is to alert ecologists to the ethologist s tools for measuring social dynamics. Social Dynamics If animals live together in groups their genes must get more benefit out of the association than they put in Dawkins 1989 . What methods are available to measure the negotiations the social dynamics in this profit and loss account We define a social dynamic simply as the change in social interaction or relationship under the influence of extrinsic or intrinsic factors. Our purpose here is to show how these changes and the factors influencing them may be measured and identified. Likely candidates include the forces of ecological and demographic change together with changes in the experiences and characters of group members. Ontogenic effects individuals growing up and Measuring the Dynamics of Mammalian Societies 333 changing roles might also affect the long-term social dynamics of a group that change the demography and hence the character of the society Geffen et al. 1996 . Effects on social dynamics may be erratically stochastic or predictably circadian seasonal annual or of an even longer periodicity largely following
