André Vieira Rodrigues

While foraging, animals make decisions under cognitively demanding conditions. Classical foraging theory predicts near-optimal resource selection but relies on simplified assumptions that poorly reflect environmental sensory complexity. Understanding of how animals cope with multiple sources of sensory interference is essential both for basic behavioural theory and predicting how organisms will perform in increasingly human-modified habitats. Studies have shown that perceptual ambiguity or predation risk can impair foraging performance, but these factors are almost always examined in isolation. Pollinating insects provide an ideal model to address this gap, because they are easy to study under controlled conditions while retaining high ecological relevance. I will investigate how decisionmaking changes as ecological distractors accumulate, and whether impairments are gradual or reflect limitations in how much information animals can process at once. Additionally, this project integrates optimal foraging theory with sensory ecology and cognitive load frameworks to provide a mechanistic account of how limits in information processing shape decision-making under realistic constraints. I will conduct experiments in two species: the solitary moth Macroglossum stellatarum and the social bumblebee Bombus terrestris. Across a factorial design, individuals will be exposed to combinations of three disruptors: increased flower signal similarity, altered environmental cues, and predator-like looming cues. I will quantify decision-making behaviors to test whether combined sensory challenges produce additive declines in performance, exponential overload effects, or are buffered by compensatory heuristics. Results will inform general principles of decision-making across animals, with implications for sensory ecology, cognitive robustness, and pollinator conservation in increasingly complex landscapes.