4 Discussion
Understanding the temporal and spatial processes driving contact among animals can provide insight to factors structuring a myriad of contact-based ecological processes. To this point, assessment of contact structure has generally relied on simple assumptions (e.g., high habitat resource selection area) that are often not tested. Here we assessed how well the spatial distribution of contacts matches that of general space use. Our findings in two wild pig populations highlight that the spatial overlap of individuals (population-level RSF model outputs) does not adequately represent the spatial distribution of contacts across the landscape, which challenges the accuracy of predictions of contact rates and spatial transmission dynamics if applied to landscapes outside the study areas. Specifically, landscape features that drive contact between individuals were generally different from those that drive individual-level space-use (Figure S2 and S3) in two different systems. This suggests that some factors related differently upon the way wild pigs’ interface with their landscapes in their daily lives compared to how they interact with conspecifics in the areas they inhabit.