Dear Marmam readers,
We would like to inform Marmam readers of the following workshop
entitled:
SOCPROG and the analysis of animal social
structure using individual identifications.
The workshop
is for those interested in the analysis of animal social structure in
populations within which at least some individuals are individually
identifiable, whether through natural or artificial markings, tags, genetics,
vocalizations or other means.
Presenter:
Professor Hal Whitehead, Dalhousie University, Canada.
Host: Murdoch
University’s Cetacean Research Unit (http://www.cffr.murdoch.edu.au/mucru/)
Location:
Murdoch University, Perth, Western Australia
Time:
February 8th - 10th, 2011
Costs: The
cost of attendance for external participants is $AUS 550. The cost for Murdoch
University students is $AUS 300. Lunch, tea and coffee will be provided.
Applicants: This course is designed
for postgraduate students conducting studies in the broad field of biological
– with a special interest in analyzing animal social structure. As there
is limited space available at the workshop, we encourage applicants to sign up
early. Applicants will be accepted on a first come, first serve basis. Please visit the following website for application details:
http://www.cffr.murdoch.edu.au/mucru/socprog.html
SOCPROG is a series of MATLAB programs
written by Professor Hal Whitehead for analyzing data on the social structure,
population structure and movements of identified individuals. The programs are
designed to be easy to use, most input is done through graphical user
interfaces (i.e. windows with things to click on), and most things can be done
without any knowledge of MATLAB (although this helps for custom options,
figuring out errors, making your own extensions, etc.). There is also a
compiled version of SOCPROG, so you don’t need access to MATLAB (although
you have more options if you do). The programs are also designed to be flexible
so you can tailor the analyses to your data and hypotheses. The program is free
and can be downloaded from: Professor
Hal Whitehead’s website.
The 1st day of the workshop will consider
general issues in the analysis of animal social structure (based upon the book
“Analyzing animal societies”), and on the 2nd day the focus will be
on the practical use of SOCPROG. On the 3rd day, we will look at
participants’ own data sets, trying to get as much insight as possible.
If time permits, we will consider SOCPROG’s functionality for examining
population sizes, and movements.
Workshop outline:
What is Social Structure?
Observing Interactions and Associations: Collecting Data
Organizing Data
Describing Relationships: Methods Available
Building Models of Social Structure: Methods Available
Comparing Social Structures: How Can we do this?
SOCPROG: what it does
SOCPROG: how to get and install it
SOCPROG: inputting data
SOCPROG: restricting data; setting associations and sampling periods
SOCPROG: displays of associations
SOCPROG (and other programs): network analyses
SOCPROG: tests of social hypotheses
SOCPROG: temporal changes in social structure
SOCPROG: multivariate methods, and incorporation of genetic data
SOCPROG: movement analyses
SOCPROG: population analyses
Best,
Lars Bejder