For animals that forage or travel in groups, making movement decisions often depends on
social interactions among group members 1 , 2 . However, in many cases, few individuals …

Recent models from theoretical physics have predicted that mass-migrating animal groups
may share group-level properties, irrespective of the type of animals in the group. One key …

Determining individual-level interactions that govern highly coordinated motion in animal
groups or cellular aggregates has been a long-standing challenge, central to understanding …

We present a self-organizing model of group formation in three-dimensional space, and use
it to investigate the spatial dynamics of animal groups such as fish schools and bird flocks. …

As a ripple of light the fish turn. Like some animate fluid, the school glides and turns again.
The synchrony of motion is captivating. A similar integration of behavior can be seen in a bird …

Arising from MA Nowak, CE Tarnita & EO Wilson Nature466, 1057–1062 (2010)10.1038/nature09205
; Nowak et al. reply Nowak et al. argue that inclusive fitness theory has been of …

The remarkable collective action of organisms such as swarming ants, schooling fish and
flocking birds has long captivated the attention of artists, naturalists, philosophers and scientists…

This paper reviews the literature on leadership in vertebrate groups, including recent work
on human groups, before presenting the results of three new experiments looking at …

Despite the growing interest in collective phenomena such as “swarm intelligence” and “wisdom
of the crowds,” little is known about the mechanisms underlying decision-making in …

Conflicting interests among group members are common when making collective decisions,
yet failure to achieve consensus can be costly. Under these circumstances individuals may …