Professor Innes Cuthill
M.A.(Cantab.), D.Phil.(Oxon.)
Current positions
Professor of Behavioural Ecology
School of Biological Sciences
Contact
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Biography
My career has involved a gradual, and happy, move west. My first degree was from Cambridge – a First in Natural Sciences (Zoology) – followed by a D.Phil. from Oxford in 1985, supervised by John Krebs and Alex Kacelnik. I was a Junior Research Fellow at Brasenose College, Oxford, and Demonstrator in Ornithology at the Department of Zoology in Oxford for 4 years, then moved to a lectureship at Bristol in 1989. I was awarded the 1998 Scientific Medal of the Zoological Society of London for contributions to zoology by a scientist under 40 years old and, in 2005, I won the first mid-career award for mentoring of Ph.D. students in science, from Nature, the world’s most prestigious science journal, and NESTA (the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts). The nomination was initiated by former students, perhaps even more touching than the award itself. More recently, I was awarded the 2018 Scientific Medal of the Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour, the leading professional society in the field.
Research interests
I wear two hats, behavioural ecologist and sensory ecologist, although the unifying theme is the explanation of the factors shaping the design, through natural selection, of animal form and function. If I have particular skills then they are, first, developing novel empirical tests of theoretical predictions, whether in the lab or field, and second, establishing successful interdisciplinary collaborations. Most of my work lies at the interface of different disciplines, and I have a long history of working with mathematicians to investigate behavioural decisions. More recently, and my current main research area, I have been collaborating closely with physiologists, perceptual psychologists and computational neuroscientists to understand how animal coloration (notably camouflage) evolves in response to animal colour vision.
Projects and supervisions
Research projects
Is flight important to the welfare of captive birds?
Principal Investigator
Description
Frustration of highly motivated behaviours causes welfare problems, with some evidence this may be true for flight, this being one of the most constrained natural behaviours in captive birds. Using…Managing organisational unit
School of Biological SciencesDates
01/12/2019 to 01/06/2022
Concealing 3D objects
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Biological SciencesDates
08/06/2019 to 31/12/2022
What makes an effective warning signal?
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Biological SciencesDates
01/04/2016 to 31/03/2019
The Camouflage machine: optimising patterns for camouflage and visibility
Principal Investigator
Role
Co-Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Psychological ScienceDates
01/06/2015 to 31/05/2018
8076 EPSRC EP/M000885/1 Platform Grant
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Biological SciencesDates
01/02/2015 to 31/01/2020
Thesis supervisions
Exploring the mechanisms of iridescence as camouflage
Supervisors
Effect of the Visual Environment on Avian Welfare
Supervisors
Ultraviolet reflectance, ultraviolet-induced fluorescence and mate choice in the budgerigar (Melopsittacus undulatus)
Supervisors
The social behaviour and conservation of Rothschild’s giraffes Giraffa camelopardalis rothschildi in Kenya
Supervisors
Drivers of the evolution of gregarious behaviour in larval Lepidoptera
Supervisors
Experimental studies of iridescence as camouflage
Supervisors
An Adaptive Theory for Human Belief Systems
Supervisors
How background complexity impairs target detection and can mitigate poor camouflage.
Supervisors
Understanding human-elephant interactions in and around Makgadikgadi Pans National Park, Botswana
Supervisors
Consequences of within- and between-group conflict in dwarf mongooses
Supervisors
Publications
Recent publications
03/03/2025A school-based intervention to improve mental health outcomes for children with cerebral visual impairment (CVI)
Pilot and Feasibility Studies
A computational neuroscience framework for quantifying warning signals
Methods in Ecology and Evolution
Can chicks smell their parents? No evidence of olfactory parent recognition in a shorebird
Animal Behaviour
How background complexity impairs target detection
Animal Behaviour
No sex difference in preen oil chemical composition during incubation in Kentish plovers
PeerJ
Teaching
I lecture in all three years of the B.Sc. programmes and also to postgraduate students. In year 1, I contribute some lectures on evolution; in year 2 I'm unit director for Behavioural Ecology, which I teach with Andy Radford; in year 3, I teach a unit on predator-prey interactions with Christos Ioannou. I also teach the animal behaviour field course with Andy Radford, going to the beautiful island of Lundy, off the North Devon coast. Jointly with Alistair Hetherington, I deliver postgraduate lectures on how science is funded and how to get published.
Related people
Professor Nick Scott-Samuel
Professor of Experimental Psychology
School of Psychological Science
Professor William Browne
Professor and Head of School
School of Education
Professor Michael Mendl
Professor of Animal Behaviour and Welfare
Bristol Veterinary School
Dr Laszlo Talas
Lecturer in Animal Sensing & Biometrics
Bristol Veterinary School
Dr Emma Mellor
Wild Animal Initiative Research Fellow
Bristol Veterinary School