Urban birds fly away sooner from women than men, study finds
Researchers recorded the pattern across 37 bird species in five European countries, but say the cause remains unknown and the findings are preliminary.
Men could get about one meter closer to urban birds than women could before the birds took flight, an international research team found. The study drew on 2,701 observations across five European countries.
For the experiments, men and women of matching height and wearing similar clothing approached birds directly in urban parks and other green areas. Researchers recorded the distance between each person and the bird when it flew away, a measure known as flight initiation distance.
The findings, published in People and Nature, a British Ecological Society journal, followed the same pattern in Spain, Poland, Germany, France and Czechia. The difference appeared in all 37 species studied, from easily startled magpies to pigeons that generally let people come closer.
The team believes the results indicate that birds can distinguish men from women, but it has not identified the cues involved. Scent, body shape and walking patterns are possible explanations, not established causes.
Dr. Yanina Benedetti of the Czech University of Life Sciences Prague suggested testing such characteristics separately in follow-up experiments. The researchers stressed that the findings remain preliminary and that more work is needed to determine whether the pattern holds in other settings and populations.
