| Con Slobodchikoff | |
|---|---|
| Born | China |
| Institutions | Northern Arizona University |
| Alma mater | University of California, Berkeley |
| Known for | referential communication in prairie dogs |
Constantine 'Con' Slobodchikoff is an animal behaviorist and conservation biologist. He is a professor at Northern Arizona University where he studies referential communication, using prairie dogs (Cynomys gunnisoni) as a model species. Much of his recent research has shown a complex communicative ability of the Gunnison prairie dog alarm calls.[1] In early 2008 he formed the Animal language Institute [2] to create a place where people can find and share research in animal communication.
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He was born in China to Russian émigré parents, and moved to the United States as a young child with his parents, who settled in San Francisco. Slobodchikoff’s early love of biology was fostered by his membership in his teenage years in the Student Section of the California Academy of Sciences, where he went on numerous field trips to different habitats in California. He received an A. A. degree from City College of San Francisco in 1964, and a B. S. in 1966 and Ph. D. degree in 1971 both from the University of California, Berkeley.[3] After receiving his Ph. D., Slobodchikoff joined the biology faculty of Northern Arizona University, where he remains today as a tenured professor.[1] He also was a Fulbright Fellow and a Visiting Professor at Kenyatta University in Kenya in 1983.[3][4]
His initial research involved the behavior and ecology of tenebrionid beetles and their response to vertebrate predators. However, in the mid-1980s he switched his research efforts to studying the social behavior and communication of prairie dogs. He has been decoding the communication system of alarm calls, and he and his students have found that prairie dogs have a sophisticated communication system that can identify the species of predator and provides descriptive information about the size, shape, and color of the individual predator animal.
Slobodchikoff has published numerous papers in animal behavior, ecology, and evolution. One of his better known papers on evolution was published with Thomas G. Whitham in 1981 in the journal Oecologia: Evolution of individuals, plant-herbivore interactions, and mosaics of genetic variability: the adaptive significance of somatic mutations in plants. [5] A seminal paper on prairie dog communication was published in 1991 in the journal Animal Behaviour: Semantic information distinguishing individual predators in the alarm calls of Gunnison's prairie dogs.[6] He has been editor or co-editor of several books including: Concepts of Species; [7] A New Ecology: Novel Approaches to Interactive Systems; [8] and The Ecology of Social Behavior.[9] He is lead author, along with Bianca S. Perla and Jennifer L. Verdolin, of the book: Prairie Dogs: Communication and Community in an Animal Society, published by Harvard University Press.[10]
Slobodchikoff’s work with the prairie dog communication system has been featured in a number of video productions, magazines, radio interviews, and newspaper accounts. His video appearances included: NBC Dateline, ABC World News with Peter Jennings, CNN, Country Canada, Quantum (Australian Broadcasting Corporation), Teirzeit (Belgian-German TV), BBC,[11] Turner Broadcasting, Brixen Productions (Discovery Channel), Evolve (History Channel). Radio interviews have been with: NPR All Things Considered, BBC radio, PBS Flagstaff, Phoenix, Santa Fe, Idaho, and Colorado. Magazine stories about his work have appeared in: Smithsonian Magazine, National Geographic, People Magazine, Discover Magazine, the Phoenician, Best Friends Magazine, Boy’s Life, Reader’s Digest. Newspaper stories about his work have appeared in: LA Times, Boston Globe, Denver Post, Arizona Republic, Arizona Daily Sun, Arizona Daily Star, Washington Post, NY Times, among others.