# Interaction Mechanisms Quantified from Dynamical Features of Frog Choruses

## TL;DR

This study combines mathematical modeling and empirical data to quantify interaction mechanisms in frog choruses, revealing how male frogs allocate attention based on behavioral strategies to optimize mate attraction.

## Contribution

It introduces a Bayesian-identified phase oscillator model for frog interactions and links attention levels to behavioral parameters, providing new insights into acoustic communication strategies.

## Key findings

- Identified a model that reproduces frog chorus dynamics
- Discovered a negative correlation between attention and inter-frog distance
- Indicated frogs selectively pay attention to less attractive males

## Abstract

Interaction mechanism in the acoustic communication of actual animals is investigated by combining mathematical modeling and empirical data. Here we use a deterministic mathematical model (a phase oscillator model) to describe the interaction mechanism underlying the choruses of male Japanese tree frogs (Hyla japonica) in which the male frogs attempt to avoid call overlaps with each other due to acoustic communication. The mathematical model with a general interaction term is identified by a Bayesian approach from multiple audio recordings on the choruses of three male frogs. The identified model qualitatively reproduces the stationary and dynamical features of the empirical data, supporting the validity of the model identification. In addition, we quantify the magnitude of attention paid among the male frogs from the identified model, and then analyze the relationship between the attention and behavioral parameters by using a statistical model. The analysis demonstrates the biologically valid relationship about the negative correlation between the attention and inter-frog distance, and also indicates the existence of a behavioral strategy that the male frogs selectively pay attention towards a less attractive male frog so as to utilize the advantage of their attractiveness for effective mate attraction.