Evidence map›Paper›PMID 39996251›Full record

ArticleCurrent zoology2025

The sound of fear is heritable.

Daniel T Blumstein, Natalie Vu, Megan Edic, Linh Vo, Julien G A Martin

Abstract read
PubMed Full text at PMC Publisher
In one paragraph

Article in Current zoology, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
1citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

1 citing paper in PubMed.

  1. Nonlinear phenomena in marmot alarm calls: a mechanism encoding fear?Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025
    Review
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Daniel T BlumsteinDepartment of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, 621 Young Drive South, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1606, USA.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5793-9244
Natalie VuDepartment of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, 621 Young Drive South, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1606, USA.
Megan EdicDepartment of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, 621 Young Drive South, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1606, USA.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9457-8270
Linh VoDepartment of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, 621 Young Drive South, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1606, USA.ORCID https://orcid.org/0009-0005-7110-854X
Julien G A MartinThe Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory, Box 519, Crested Butte, CO 81224, USA.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7726-6809

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The nonlinearity and fear hypothesis predicts that highly aroused vocal mammals and birds produce vocalizations (notably alarm calls and screams) which contain a variety of nonlinear phenomena (NLP). Such vocalizations often sound "noisy" because vocal production systems are over-blown when animals are highly aroused. While much is known about the conditions under which animals produce vocalizations containing NLP and how species respond to them, there is little research about the heritability of such behavioral traits. Using the quantitative genetic animal model, we estimated the genetic basis of "noise" in alarm calls produced by females and found significant heritability in call entropy-our measure of the noisiness. About 9% of the variance in noisiness can be accounted for by genetic differences. Taken together, these findings suggest that the degree to which marmots produce noisy calls is modestly heritable and can be thus subject to further evolution via natural selection.

Indexed as

acoustic communicationanimal modelfear communicationheritability of vocalizationsyellow-bellied marmot

Identifiers

PMID39996251
PMCPMC11847014

What OpenQuestion holds

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LicenceCC BY-NC
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Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.