Animal Behavior

1. Animal Behavior Chapter 51

2. Animal Behavior is… • what an animal does and how it does it in response to an external or internal stimulus • carried out by muscles or glands (using hormones) under the control of the nervous system. • a result of environmental AND genetic factors • essential for animal survival and reproduction • innate or learned

3. Innate Animal Behavior • Unlearned behaviors that organisms are born with • Example: newly hatched cuckoos will instinctively try to push other eggs out of the nest (promote survival of self) • Example: human babies instinctively watch and smile at faces • Example: human babies kick their legs/move their arms in water and have the sucking reflex • Example: pill bugs are more active when it is dry (trying to find moisture) • Example: fish/whales can swim as soon as they are born • Reflexes and instincts are innate

4. Fixed Action Patterns • A fixed action pattern is a sequence of unlearned, innate behaviors that is unchangeable • Once initiated, it is usually carried to completion • A fixed action pattern is triggered by an external cue known as a sign stimulus • Example: Egg retrieval by Greylag geese if the egg is moved outside the nest (sign stimulus is egg outside nest) • http://www.pigeon.psy.tufts.edu/psych26/fap.htm • Example: Mating dances often carried out by male birds (sign stimulus is the presence of a female bird)

5. Fixed Action Patterns • Example: In male stickleback fish, the stimulus for attack behavior is the red underside of an intruder • When presented with unrealistic models, as long as some red is present, the attack behavior occurs

6. Kinesis • A kinesis is a simple change in activity or turning rate in response to a stimulus • For example, sow bugs become more active in dry areas and less active in humid areas • Though sow bug behavior varies with humidity, sow bugs do not move toward or away from specific moisture levels

7. Taxis • A taxis is a more or less automatic, oriented movement toward or away from a stimulus • Many stream fish exhibit a positive taxis and automatically swim in an upstream direction • This taxis prevents them from being swept away and keeps them facing the direction from which food will come

8. Learned Animal Behavior • Animals process and integrate information gained from specific experiences to vary or change responses to stimuli • Types of learned behavior: • Imprinting • Habituation • Spatial Learning • Cognitive Mapping • Associative learning • Classical Conditioning • Operant Conditioning • Cognition

9. Imprinting is … • a combination of learned and innate components and is generally irreversible • distinguished from other learning by a sensitive period = a limited developmental phase that is the only time when certain behaviors can be learned • Example: young geese following their real mother • Experiment : Konrad Lorenz showed that when baby geese spent the first few hours of their life with him, they imprinted on him as their parent • Also saved the whooping cranes!

10. Habituation is… • a loss of responsiveness to stimuli that convey little or no information • the “cry wolf” effect • the nervous system doesn’t focus on stimuli that are irrelevant to survival and reproduction • Examples: • Birds stop responding to alarm calls from others if they are not followed by attacks • Sunglasses on your head • Not getting up when the bell rings a million times in the middle of the day

11. Spatial Learning is… • behavior based on structure of the environment • Example: digger wasps use landmarks to find their nests • They used the bushes/trees to mark the nest, when these were moved, they still flew to the center even though the nest was not there…use VISUAL CUES

12. Cognitive Maps … • help animals to develop spatial relationships between objects in their surroundings • are a representation made in the nervous system (brain) where the halfway point is even though the objects have moved • Example: nutcracker birds store pine seeds halfway between 2 landmarks to be used later in the winter

13. Associative learning is… • when animals make associations between experiences • Example: a mouse eats a brightly colored monarch butterfly that has a foul taste so the mouse learns to associate bright colors with foul taste • Classical Conditioning - arbitrary stimulus becomes associated with a particular outcome • Example: Pavlov’s dogs, the ringing bell and FOOD • Operant Conditioning – animals learn to associate a behavior with a reward or punishment (trial and error learning) • Example: predator avoids prey that are associated with pain

14. Cognition is… • the most complex learning • an animal’s nervous system perceives, stores and processes information from sensory receptors • ability to problem solve

15. Communication • Animals can use signals (actions or cues) to communicate with one another • Signals can be: • Chemicals such as pheromones – chemicals that can attract mates • Visual such as male baboons “yawning” to expose teeth as a threat to others; courtship displays like the peacock feathers or strange dances/postures; honeybees doing the waggle vs. round dance to show location of food • Acoustical such as bird songs • Occasionally there are illegitimate receivers and signalers – the wrong organism sends or receives the signal

16. Bees Waggle vs. Round Dance

17. Sexual Selection • the evolutionary outcome of competition for mates and selectivity among potential mates • Example: Blue footed booby dance • Example: peacock feather display • Example: decorate the “lair” and hope the mate likes it • Example: coloration of male cardinals or mallard ducks • Example: song of the male • Example: male who wins the “battle”

18. Behavior is influenced by natural selection…it can change over time • Reproductive Success – survival and reproduction of offspring • Adaptive Behavior – promotes the propagation of an individual’s genes (pass on the genes) • Social Behavior – interdependent interactions among organisms of the same species • Selfish Behavior – an individual increases its own chances of reproduction • Altruistic Behavior – self-sacrificing behavior that helps others in the species and decreases the individual’s own chance to reproduce • The individual is NOT aware it is doing this • Example: ravens call to attract others to share when they find a carcass, attracting other ravens and potentially predators