A multi-level approach to quantify speed-accuracy trade-offs in great tits (Parus major)

Animals often face a conflict between the speed and accuracy by which a decision is made. Decisions taken quickly might be relatively inaccurate, whereas decisions taken more slowly might be more accurate. Such "speed-accuracy trade-offs" receive increasing attention in behavioral and cognitive sciences. Importantly, life-history theory predicts that trade-offs typically exist only at certain hierarchical levels, such as within rather than among individuals. We therefore examined within- and among-individual correlations in the speed and accuracy by which decisions are taken, using a foraging context in wild-caught great tits (Parus major) as a worked example. We find that great tits exhibit among-individual variation in speed-accuracy trade-offs: some individuals predictably made relatively slow but accurate decisions, whereas others were predictably faster but less accurate. We did not, however, find evidence for the trade-off at the within-individual level. These level-specific relationships imply that different mechanisms acted across levels. These findings highlight the need for future work on the integration of individual behavior and cognition across hierarchical levels.