{"id":353,"date":"2025-08-18T07:46:53","date_gmt":"2025-08-18T14:46:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/?p=353"},"modified":"2025-08-18T07:46:53","modified_gmt":"2025-08-18T14:46:53","slug":"in-goose-societies-bold-leaders-and-curious-followers-shape-the-flock","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/2025\/08\/18\/in-goose-societies-bold-leaders-and-curious-followers-shape-the-flock\/","title":{"rendered":"In Goose Societies Bold Leaders and Curious Followers Shape the Flock"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Leadership is not about dominance but about courage and curiosity. A new study from the University of Vienna shows that bold geese, rather than aggressive ones, are more likely to become flock leaders, while exploratory individuals play the role of first followers. Conducted at the Konrad Lorenz Research Station in Austria and published in <em>iScience<\/em>, the research tracked greylag geese (<em>Anser anser<\/em>) over four years, revealing that personality traits predict who initiates flight and who responds, reshaping long-standing assumptions about animal influence and collective movement.<\/p>\n<h2>Personality Shapes Collective Behavior<\/h2>\n<p>The researchers color-banded and observed 117 individually marked geese, recording 742 group departure events. By combining detailed field notes with standardized behavioral assays, they measured three personality traits: boldness (flight initiation distance), aggressiveness (mirror response), and exploration (novel-object interaction). They found that:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Bolder geese recruited more followers and held higher &#8220;influencer scores&#8221;.<\/li>\n<li>Exploratory geese were more likely to be first followers, spreading information and innovation.<\/li>\n<li>Aggressiveness, despite predicting dominance in other contexts, did not correlate with leadership.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The study demonstrates that stable personality traits persist for years and shape how geese coordinate daily movements to feeding and roosting sites in the Alpine valley.<\/p>\n<h2>Bold Protectors and Curious Scouts<\/h2>\n<p>Each decision to move carries tradeoffs: safety in familiar grounds versus opportunities in new areas. Bold leaders help manage risk by offering protection, while curious followers aid discovery. This dynamic partnership highlights a protective style of leadership rather than a dominant one.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;This research helps to explain why individuals with specific traits consistently wield more influence,&#8221; says lead author Sonia Kleindorfer. &#8220;More importantly, it draws attention to followers \u2013 often overlooked in our human fascination with securing resources.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The findings challenge traditional models of leadership focused on aggression and rank. Instead, they underscore the cognitive role of followers in choosing whom to trust, shaping information flow and cultural transmission in goose societies.<\/p>\n<h2>Lessons Beyond the Flock<\/h2>\n<p>By shifting attention from dominance to decision-making strategies, the work opens new avenues for understanding collective behavior across species, including humans. It suggests that cultural evolution, from migration patterns in birds to group decisions in primates, may depend as much on attentive followers as on charismatic leaders.<\/p>\n<p>For more on the geese, see a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Xt2wEKDVbgI\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">video from the Konrad Lorenz Research Station<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><em>Journal: iScience. DOI: <a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1016\/j.isci.2025.112345\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">10.1016\/j.isci.2025.112345<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Leadership is not about dominance but about courage and curiosity. A new study from the University of Vienna shows that bold geese, rather than aggressive ones, are more likely to become flock leaders, while exploratory individuals play the role of first followers. Conducted at the Konrad Lorenz Research Station in Austria and published in iScience, &#8230; <a title=\"In Goose Societies Bold Leaders and Curious Followers Shape the Flock\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/2025\/08\/18\/in-goose-societies-bold-leaders-and-curious-followers-shape-the-flock\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about In Goose Societies Bold Leaders and Curious Followers Shape the Flock\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1298,"featured_media":354,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-353","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-behavior"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.4 (Yoast SEO v27.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>In Goose Societies Bold Leaders and Curious Followers Shape the Flock - Wild Science<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/2025\/08\/18\/in-goose-societies-bold-leaders-and-curious-followers-shape-the-flock\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"In Goose Societies Bold Leaders and Curious Followers Shape the Flock\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Leadership is not about dominance but about courage and curiosity. 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The remarkable behavior, documented by University of Tennessee researcher Vladimir Dinets, represents the most sophisticated use of human\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Behavior&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Behavior","link":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/category\/behavior\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Adult Cooper\u2019s hawk dispatching a house sparrow. 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The study, which tracked 13 chacma baboons across South Africa's Cape Peninsula using high-precision GPS collars,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Behavior&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Behavior","link":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/category\/behavior\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Baboons walking in progression on South Africa\u2019s Cape Peninsula","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/06\/swansea-baboons-.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/06\/swansea-baboons-.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/06\/swansea-baboons-.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/06\/swansea-baboons-.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":53,"url":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/2025\/04\/20\/songbirds-express-personality-through-tunes\/","url_meta":{"origin":353,"position":3},"title":"Songbirds Express Personality Through Tunes","author":"Team Wild Science","date":"April 20, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Did you know that birds might be singing about who they really are? Scientists in Australia have discovered that tiny colorful birds called superb fairy-wrens actually reveal their personalities through their songs! Just like how some people are shy and others are outgoing, birds have different personalities too. Some fairy-wrens\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Behavior&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Behavior","link":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/category\/behavior\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"malurus cyaneus","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/04\/malurus-cyaneus.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/04\/malurus-cyaneus.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/04\/malurus-cyaneus.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/04\/malurus-cyaneus.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":215,"url":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/2025\/05\/14\/orangutan-moms-show-distinct-parenting-styles\/","url_meta":{"origin":353,"position":4},"title":"Orangutan Moms Show Distinct Parenting Styles","author":"Team Wild Science","date":"May 14, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Not all orangutan mothers parent alike, according to pioneering research that tracked wild Sumatran orangutans for 15 years. The study, published Tuesday in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, documents for the first time how individual orangutan mothers consistently differ in their parenting approaches\u2014even with different offspring. Researchers from the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Behavior&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Behavior","link":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/category\/behavior\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"A Sumatran orangutan mother-infant pair at Suaq. Mother, Cissy, is seen carrying her infant, Cinnamon.","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/05\/cissy-and-cinammon.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/05\/cissy-and-cinammon.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/05\/cissy-and-cinammon.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/05\/cissy-and-cinammon.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":67,"url":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/wildscience\/2025\/04\/22\/love-hormone-turns-mean-girl-lemurs-nice\/","url_meta":{"origin":353,"position":5},"title":"Love Hormone Turns Mean Girl Lemurs Nice","author":"Team Wild Science","date":"April 22, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Researchers have discovered why some female lemurs have abandoned their bullying ways, pointing to changes in how the \"love hormone\" oxytocin affects their brains. The findings could have implications for understanding aggression in other species, including humans. In most lemur societies, females reign supreme through physical intimidation. 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