Fig. 3

a Extent to which the ants jump from their respective positions (0) in forward (positive steps) or backward (negative steps) directions. For clarity, data is presented only for one group of eight ants and that too, for the ants at only four positions viz., position 1 (leading ant, solid black bars), position 3 (Open bars), position 5 (light shaded bars), and position 8 (tail ant, dark shaded bar). Note that the leading ant is almost always at it’s leading position except in about 5% of observation events when it has moved back by a single step. b Average frequencies of jumps for ants in a group of eight ants from their respective positions (0) in forward (positive steps) or backward (negative steps) directions. This graph has data pooled for all the eight ants unlike in Fig. 3a where only four of the eight ants are represented. c Standard deviation for the number of steps jumped by the ants at different positions in the group with eight ants