Wasps Use Social Eavesdropping to Learn about Individual Rivals.

Many animals minimize the costs of conflict by using social eavesdropping to learn about the fighting ability of potential rivals before they interact. Learning about individual conspecifics via social eavesdropping allows individuals to assess potential opponents without personal risk. However, keeping track of a network of individually differentiated social relationships is thought to be cognitively challenging.

Rapid juvenile hormone downregulation in subordinate wasp queens facilitates stable cooperation.

In many cooperatively breeding animals, subordinate group members have lower reproductive capacity than dominant group members. Theory suggests subordinates may downregulate their reproductive capacity because dominants punish subordinates who maintain high fertility. However, there is little direct experimental evidence that dominants cause physiological suppression in subordinates.