any of the resource assessment procedures seen in a fight are similar to those used in selecting empty shells. In this way, motivational models can be developed to explain the timing of decisions over empty shells, and these can in turn be incorporated into models created to explain agonistic interactions (Elwood and Neil 25).
Shells are an important resource for the hermit crab, and different shells have different effects on the fitness of the inhabitant. The crab must have an optimal shell, and, in encounters with other crabs, this is seen as the crab typically engages in a series of activities ending when he either rejects that shell or moves out of the old shell and into the new one. This series of activities seems to be the process of information gathering and decision making for the crab (Elwood and Neil 53).
Conover reports on a study on shell selection by the hermit crab that focused on the Pagurus pollicaris in a natural population and in laboratory experiments. The crabs were collected in Tampa Bay, south of St. Petersburg, Flo
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