The Animal Culture Database (ACDB) is a comparative database of cultural behaviors across nonhuman animal species. It synthesizes current literature on intra-species behavioral variation in contexts such as communication, foraging, and migration into a relational database accessible through an open-access Shiny app.
The ACDB aims to:
- Document socially transmitted behaviors: Record instances of cultural behaviors observed in wild animal populations.
- Analyze cultural diversity: Examine patterns of cultural diversity globally and across different species.
- Inform conservation research: Incorporate knowledge of socially transmitted behaviors to better inform biodiversity conservation policies.
- Interactive map: Visualize the geographic distribution of recorded populations with cultural behaviors.
- Search and filter: Search and filter data by species, behavior types, transmission modes, and other variables.
- Data access: Download current data tables for further analysis.
- Data contribution: Submit new data through a standardized form and guidelines.
- Explore the map: Navigate the interactive world map to view recorded populations and their cultural behaviors.
- Search and filter: Use the search functionality to find specific species or behaviors of interest.
- Download data: Access the "Download Data" section to download data tables in CSV format.
- Contribute data: Follow the guidelines in the "Contribute" section to submit new data for inclusion in the database.
Resources with functionalities that overlap with ACDB:
- D-PLACE: Database of Places, Language, Culture and Environment. It can be found here.
You can access the ACDB Shiny app here. The app provides an interactive interface to explore the database.
app.R: The Shiny app script.db/: Dataset files used by the app.www/: Additional resources for the app (images, stylesheets).README.md: This file.LICENSE: License information.
We welcome contributions from researchers to expand and update the database. Please see the Contribution Guidelines for instructions on how to submit your data.
This project is licensed under the MIT License.
For questions or comments, please contact Kiran Basava.