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142 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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what is animal behaviour? |
any internally coordinated, externally visible pattern of activity that responds to changing external or internal conditions |
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what is an ethogram? |
formal description/inventory of an animal's behaviour |
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what is a time budget? |
summary of total time and relative freq of different behaviours of an individual |
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what is anthropomorphism? |
attributing human motivations, characteristics or emotions to animals |
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reason for "guilty look" in dogs |
submissive behaviour in response to scolding |
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what are darwin's 3 conditions for evolution by natural selection? |
- variation exists among individuals in a pop in traits - individuals' different traits are at least somewhat heritable - some traits give differences in fitness |
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what are the different measures of heritability? |
- parent-offspring regression analysis - selection experiment method |
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what is the parent-offspring regression analysis? |
- measure of heritability - examines similarity between parents and offspring in traits they posess - if trait has genetic basis, themn trait values of offspring should be similar to that of parents |
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what is the selection experiment method? |
- measure of heritability - different groups of individuals subject to differential selection on trait in question - if artificial selection acting on trait results in changes in trait value in subsequent gens, then trait has genetic basis |
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what causes variation within a population? |
- different genetic compositions - different environ. conditions - differences in learning & learning ability - combinations of above |
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example of differences in learning |
trial and error learning gets bees higher rates of food delivery |
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example of how variation may not affect fitness |
eastern screech owls show great variation in dispersal direction and distance |
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what is optimal trait value? |
the trait that confers the highest fitness in a pop in a particular environ. |
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what is the cost-benefit approach to studying adaptation? |
identify costs and benefits of different traits to determine which trait has the highest net benefit |
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what are the hypotheses of stotting in thomson's gazelle? |
- alarm signal hypothesis: signals others nearby as alarm -- inclusive fitness - social cohesion hypothesis: acting in group together - confusion effect hypothesis: confuses the predator by having lots of them perform stotting - pursuit deterrence: idea that it says that they have lots of energy for a chase |
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what are the hypotheses for fear screams in rabbits |
- startle hypothesis - kin selection hypothesis: tells others nearby to run - calling for help from parents - calling other predators |
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what are the reasons for optimal covey size in northern bobwhite quail? |
- least amount of daily movement seen in covey size of 10 -- increases daily survival rate |
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what are the different forms selection to explain cooperation? |
- individual selection: NS at individual level - group selection: selection that favours particular groups of individuals over other such groups of the same spp - kin selection: individuals increase their fitness by helping close relatives - inclusive fitness: sum of individual fitness and fitness gained via kin selection - mutilevel selection: selection on both groups and individuals |
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what is Hamilton's rule? |
C < r*B C: cost to actor r: coefficient of relatedness B: benefit to receiver |
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Do lemmings commit suicide for group selection? |
they do not: when population levels are high, they disperse to reduce intraspecific competition |
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what is sexual selection? |
selection on heritable traits that affect repro |
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what is sexual dimorphism |
morphological differences between sexes |
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is there sexual selection in house finches? |
yes: red is a sexually selected trait -- females spent most time with males with most intense red |
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what are proximate explanations for behavioural evolution? |
focus on understanding the immediate causes of behaviour |
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what are ultimate explanations of behavioural evolution? |
focus on understanding the ultimate causes of behaviour via evolution |
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what are the timbergens proximate quesitons? |
what mechanism caused the behaviour? how does the behaviour develop? |
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what are timbergen's ultimate questions? |
what is the function of the behaviour? how did the behaviour evolve? |
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what is the observational method to study behaviour? |
observe and record behaviour without manuipulating the environment or animals |
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what are the four main methods of the observational method? |
- ad libitum: observe and record everything you see - focal animal: pay attention to one animal and record all behaviours for a preset time period - scan sampling: at preset time points (eg. every five minutes) record what an animal is doing for a short time period - all occurrence sampling: instead of focusing on individual animals, observer records the occurrence of particular behaviours in the group |
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what is the experimental method for studying behaviour? |
- manipulate or change a variable to examine how it affects the behaviour of the animal |
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what is the comparative method? |
examine differences and similarities between spp to understand the evolution of behaviours |
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what are the two types of traits in the comparative method? |
- ancestral (plesiomorphic) traits: found in common ancestor of two or more spp - derived (apomorphic) traits: found in more recently evolved spp and not present in common ancestor |
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what is innate/instict behaviour? |
behaviours performed the same way each tim, fully expressed the first time displayed, and present even in individuals raised in isolation |
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what are reflexes |
involuntary movement in response to stimulus |
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what is a fixed action pattern? |
behaviour that displays almost no variation and once started, cannot be stopped until complete |
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why are there fewer yellow fruit flies in nature? |
differences in courtship behaviour result in reduced mating success of yellow individuals |
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what is a major gene vs a minor gene? |
major: individual gene that is responsible for a large fraction of phenotypic variation minor: individual gene that contributes to small amounts of variation in the phenotype |
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what is QTL? |
quantitative trait loci: stretches of DNA that either contain or are linked to genes influecning a trait such as behaviour |
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what is QTL mapping? |
stat technique that combines genetic info with trait info to determines which regions of the genome contain genes that influence the trait QTLs |
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what is a candidate gene? |
major genes suspected of contributing to a large amount of the phenotypoc variation in a specific trait |
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what is the conclusion for aphid feeding behaviour and ATL mapping |
a few genes may be involved with plant selection behaviour |
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what is the knockout technique? |
procedure to eliminate the expression of a gene |
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what are the different genetic effects on a phenotype? |
- additive effects: avg. effect of individual alleles on the phenotype - dominance effects: interaction between alleles at one locus - epistasis: interaction between genes at different loci |
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closed-ended learners vs open-ended learners |
closed: individuals must be taught by a tutor open: can learn throughout life |
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what is the FoxP2 gene for? |
normal song development in birds |
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what are gene environment interactions? |
when particular environments have greater effects on phenotypic expression of some genes than others |
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what is nash equilibria? |
the point(s) where neither player can unilaterally shift strategies in a way that increases pay off |
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what is learning? |
a relatively permanent change in behaviour resulting from experience |
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when does learning evolve? |
in variable but predictable situations |
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when does learning evolve? |
in variable but predictable situations |
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when does learning evolve? |
in variable but predictable situations |
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what is habituation? |
reduction and then lack of response to a stimulus over time |
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what is a stimulus (environmental) |
anything in the environment (abiotic/biotic) than an individual can perceive |
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what is a response |
reaction to stimulus |
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what is imprinting? |
rapid learning that occurs in young animals during short, intensive period which has long lasting effects |
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what are dendritic spines and why do they grow? |
spines on dendrites that grow due to learning |
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what is episodic memory? |
memory of a specific object, place, and time |
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what is spatial memory associated with in regards to stored food? |
the hippocampus (hippocampal formation) |
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what is stimulus-response association? |
making an association between an environmental and a subsequent behavioural response |
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what is classical conditioning? |
learning new associations between a stimulus and an innate or unlearned response -- stimulus and response don't need to be related |
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what is operant conditioning? |
consequences of a behaviour have effects on further expressions of that behaviour |
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what are the types of operant conditioning? |
- positive reinforcement - negative reinforcement - punishment - extinction |
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what is positive reinforcement operant conditioning? |
a positive experience during certain behaviour induces further performance of the same behaviour |
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what is negative reinforcement operant conditioning? |
avoidance of a negative experience induces further performance of the same behaviour |
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what is punishment operant conditioning? |
a negative experience during a certain behaviour reduces further performance of the same behaviour |
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what is extinction operant conditioning? |
the performance of a behaviour is reduced in the absense of reward or avoiding of a negative signal |
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what is a learning curve? |
a decline in errors over time during operant conditioning |
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what is taste aversion? |
if an animal becomes sick after first taste of novel food, even if occurring hours after ingesting, the animal will likely avoid in the future -- occurs after one experience and behaviour is strong and long lasting |
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what is social learning? |
using other individuals as a source of info for learning (eg. by observing) |
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what is cognition? |
ability to generate and store mental representations of the physical and social environment to motivate behaviour or solve problems |
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what is insight learning? |
spontaneous problem solving without the benefit of trial and error learning |
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what are two examples of sensory modalities used to find food in fish? |
- mechanoreceptors - lateral line system |
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how do catfish find their prey? |
they track the wake of their prey using the lateral line system |
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how do visual predators find cryptic prey more effectively? |
they learn a search image |
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what does optimal foraging theory assume? |
- foragers maximize fitness by maximizing energy intake rate - food items encountered one at a time in proportion to their abundance - food items can be ranked by profitability |
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what are two well known optimal foraging theory models? |
- diet model - patch-use model |
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what is profitability in the optimal diet model? |
energy/handling time |
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what is the zero-one rule in foraging? |
each food item is either always eaten or always rejected |
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what does the optimal patch-use model in foraging predict? |
optimal time to spend exploiting each patch |
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what are the costs animals experience when feeding? |
- energetic costs - predation risk costs - missed opportunity costs |
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what is cryptic colouration? |
body colouration that matches the colour of the environment |
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what is behavioural trade-off? |
sacrificing one behaviour for another |
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what is vigilance behaviour? |
scanning the environment for predators |
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how does vigilance behaviour change when in the presence of a predator? |
increased vigilance behaviour when in presence of predator |
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what is the dilution effect of social groups? |
the probability of dying in a successful predator attack is decreased by the presence of others |
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what is the selfish herd hypothesis in antipredator behaviour? |
- a predator is more likely to kill a member on the outside of a social group - individuals can reduce predation risk by moving to center of a group |
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how does vigilance behaviour change with group size? |
vigilance behaviour decreases as group size increases |
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what is mobbing behaviour? |
harrassment of a predator by multiple individuals |
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what is dispersal? |
a relatively short distanced unidirectional movement |
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what is the competition hypothesis for dispersion? |
dispersal functions to reduce competition for resources |
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what is inbreeding avoidance? |
dispersion to reduce probability of inbreeding |
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what is breeding dispersal? |
- abandoning one breeding site and moving to another |
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what is site fidelity? |
individuals that remain at or return to a previous location to breed |
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what is public information in animal behaviour? |
information obtained by the activity or performance of others |
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what is migration? |
relatively long-distance bidirectional movement |
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what are the 5 compass systems that animals follow to determine direction? |
- orientation: determination and maintenance of a proper direction - navigation: determining a particular locaiton and moving towards it - sun compass: uses the sun for orientation - star compass: use of stars to orient - geomagnetic compass: able to orient using earth's magnetic field |
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what are the 3 types of migrants:
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- long-distance migrants: completely shift their geographical range during breeding season, and then again for overwintering
- short-distance: make shorter journeys such as to different parts of a geographical feature - partial migrants: some individuals migrate, others remain |
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what is a flyway |
route that birds and bats follow during migration that follows geographical features such as rivers, coasts, etc. |
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how does an animal decide when to migrate |
- breeding or resource availability - climatic factors - physiological condition - photoperiod cues |
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what are the 5 ways an animal will migrate? |
- weather patterns or sea currents - physical landmarks - stellar cues - solar cues - geomagnetic cues |
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what is bicoordinate navigation? |
ability to identify a geographic location using two varying environmental gradients |
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how does salmon use homing migration? |
use olfaction imprinting and geomagnetic reception |
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why is homing common behaviour? |
- local adaptations to increase fitness - assurance of good quality habitat - lots of potential mates |
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what is homing (natal philpatry)? |
returning of an individual to birthplace for reproduction |
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what is straying? |
dispersal of individuals to non-natal areas for reproduction |
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what are the risks of homing? |
- increased competition for mates and suitable habitat - inbreeding depression -- reduced fitness of offspring |
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what are the benefits of straying? |
- buffers against variation in habitat quality - allows colonization of new habitats and recolonization of old - opportunity for genetic mixing - reducing density dependent effects |
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what factors affect the proportion of homers and strays? |
- environmental - density dependence - development |
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what are the two types of scents salmon follow to home? |
- unique chemical scents from natal stream - scents from conspecifics |
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what is a good predictor of straying behaviour in juvenile salmon? |
- movement while imprinting |
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what are the 5 assumptions of the ideal free distribution model? |
- individuals attempt to max fitness - habitat locations differ in resources - fitness is negatively density-dependent - individuals are equal competitors - individuals are free to move with no cost |
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what does the ideal free distribution model predict? |
predicts the relative number of individuals in habitats at one time |
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what is the allee effect? |
- positive density dependence --> higher fitness at low density |
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what is conspecific cueing? |
presence of another cues to a high-quality location |
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what is conspecific attraction? |
when individuals prefer to settle near others |
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what are the two hypotheses for conspecific attraction? |
- allee effect - conspecific cueing |
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what is territory? |
an area defended to obtain exclusive access to the resources contained |
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what is a home range? |
areas of repeated use that are not defended from conspecifics |
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what is resource holding power? |
the ability to win an aggressive encounter |
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what is the hawk-dove model? |
game theory model used to understand variation in fighting behaviour |
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what is the sequential assessment model? |
game theory model to understand fighting when resource holding power is not the same |
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what is the challenge hypothesis? |
male-male interactions stimulate testosterone production and sustain subsequent agressive behaviour |
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what is the winner effect? |
winning an aggressive encounter enhavnces likelihood of winning subsequent encounters |
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what is operational sex ratio? |
proportion of sexually receptive males to sexually receptive females |
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what is the general trend in operational sex ratio? |
male-bias |
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what is parental investment? |
any investment by a parent in offspring that reduces likelihood of future successful offspring production |
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what is parental investment? |
any investment by a parent in offspring that reduces likelihood of future successful offspring production |
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what is the general trend in parental investment? |
females invest more than males since males have no assurance that offspring is theirs |
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How does gamete size and mobility influence fitness of parent? |
- larger, less mobile gametes have more provisions for developing young -- increase quality of offspring - smaller, more mobile gametes can quickly locate and fertilize other gametes -- more offspring |
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what are the two biased operational sex ratio forms of increasing fitness? what do they lead to? |
- increase number of mates to increase fitness -- leads to competition for mates - higher quality of mates increases fitness -- leads to selection among mates |
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what is a sex role reversal? |
females advertise for mates instead of males |
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how do male mormon crickets do parental investment |
giving an edible nuptial gift |
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what is sexual selection |
the advantage which certain individuals have over other of same sex and species in exclusive relation to reproduction |
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what are conditional mating strategies? |
strategies that depend on the individuals condition |
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what are satellite males? |
a non-dominant male that will replace a territorial male that disappears and intercept females attracted to nearby males to engage sneak mating |
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what distinguishes conditional from distinct mating strategies? |
- phenotypes related to distinct strategies should have a clear genotypic cause - within a spp, all distinct strategies should share very similar repro success -- not the case for conditional |
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what is a conditional strategy vs distinct strategy? |
conditional: depends on environ. factors distinct: based on genetic factors |
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what is a form of sperm competition in polyandrous and social insects? |
seminal fluid that is toxic to other males |
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what are some forms of sperm competition? |
- volume of semen - polymorphic sperm - variation in sperm swimming ability - mating plugs |
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what are the costs of mate guarding? |
opportunity costs for foraging -- depends on number of neighbour males |
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what is good parent theory vs ornaments? |
good parent: a trait is indicative of paternal care of offspring ornament: a trait has nothing to do with parenting ability but may be sexually selected for |
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what is runaway selection in sexual selection? |
males with a specific trait that is preferred will be chosen as mates to have offspring with that trait |
