Animal Behavior

Question 1

What is behavior?

Answer 1

Behavior is how an animal acts in response to a particular situation or stimulus.

• influenced largely by its anatomy and physiology.
• genetic and environmental factors are involved

Question 2

What is Ethology?

Answer 2

Ethology is the study of animal behavior

Question 3

What is the syrinx?

Answer 3

The syrinx is the avarian vocal organ. Its a bony structure at the base of the trachea

Question 4

What is the function of birdsong?

Answer 4

The functions of birdsong include:

• Attracting a mate
• Inducing another bird to reveal its sex
• Establishing its territory
• Scaring away predators
• Species identification

Question 5

What is instinct?

Answer 5

An instinct is an unlearned behavior or response triggered by a specific stimulus. It is believed to be genetically influenced.

• A chick pecks at the parent’s beak to get food
• Moving your hand away from a hot stove

Question 6

What is learned behavior?

Answer 6

Learned behavior is acquired or eliminated as a result of experience. This behavior can change with time.

Question 7

What is innate behavior?

Answer 7

Innate behavior (instinct) does not change with time and occurs rapidly without mistake. 
- Squirrels twirling their tail when falling to become upright.

Question 8

What is fixed action pattern?

Answer 8

Fixed action pattern

• a series of actions triggered by a key stimulus
• acts that are performed in identical fashion.
• reflexes are the simplest fixed action pattern
• a sign stimulus (releaser) will initiate a fixed action pattern to trigger
• highly stereotyped
• Instinctive behaviors
• Triggered by a sign stimulus ( can be extinguished if sign stimulus is removed)
• Examples:
• A red object causes the stickleback fish to attack. The red object is the releaser (sign stimulus)
• Some birds mating dances have a female bird as a releaser
• Goose rolling an egg back into the nest triggered by seeing it out of the nest. Even if the egg is removed and put back in the nest while the goose is rolling it, it can’t help but continue the action as if they egg were still there.

Question 9

What is kinesis in regards to animal behavior?

Answer 9

Kinesis a simple activity change in response to a stimulus that is non-directional. Examples:

• With increased humidity, woodland mice move slower
• Pill pugs move toward a moist region

Question 10

What is taxis in regards to animal behavior?

Answer 10

Taxis is movement that is directional triggered by a stimulus

a) + taxis: Moves toward a stimulus (fish swim toward the current)
b) - taxis: Moves away from a stimulus (a cockroach moves away from a light source)

Question 11

What is the difference between kinesis and taxis?

Answer 11

Kinesis has random and undirected motion, while taxis has specific and directed motion

Question 12

What are phototaxis, chemotaxis, and magnetotaxis?

Answer 12

• Phototaxis: movement in response to light
• Chemotaxis: movement in response to a chemical
• Magnetotaxis: movement in response to a magnetic field

Question 13

What is migration?

Answer 13

Migration is the long distance location change often seen demonstrated by fish, birds, and some animals.

• expeditions that start and finish in predictable places certain times of the year
• Triggered by temperature, the availability of food, or both
• Some animals can move in a certain compass direction in a way that still baffles scientists

Question 14

What is imprinting?

Answer 14

Imprinting is a type of behavior that has both innate and learned components, but happens during a critical time period.

• An animal is exposed to a specific key stimulus early in its behavioral development and forms an association with it.
• It is difficult to modify through later experiences
• Example: Baby geese follow the first thing they see after hatching, thinking that it must be their mother

Question 15

What is Habituation?

Answer 15

Habituation is the eventual cessation of reaction to a constantly repeated stimuli

• Animals learn to stop responding to stimuli that aren’t important to them.
• It increases the animal’s reaction to new stimuli.
• Dual factor theory: When the brain realizes a stimuli is neither helpful or harmful it tunes it out to focus on other stimuli that may be harmful or helpful.
• Examples:
• Humans can tune out white noise after awhile
• Urban birds stop fleeing from humans

Question 16

What do mating ceremonies often consist of?

Answer 16

A mating ceremony will often consist of:
1) Aggressive
and
2) Appeasing behavior

For example:
- If a certain fish exhibits a “zig” toward a female, it is taken as an act of aggression. If a fish “zags” it is taken as an act of kindness

Question 17

What are some behaviors that can be involved in courtship?

Answer 17

Courtship behavior can involve:

• Mating dances: from simple to very elaborate
• Unusual displays: Flamboyant colors, raising the chest, or flaring of wings
• Nest building: nest decorating with moss, pebbles, and even flowers has been observed
• Singing
• Preening: Close contact between the pair can diffuse aggression
• Feeding: the male bird might bring the female bird a tasty treat

Question 18

What are insects mating behavior?

Answer 18

Insect mating behavior is driven by competition. There are numerous suitors available for a female insect, so the males must stand out from the crowd. The behaviors may include:

• Serenades: crickets, mosquitoes, and even fruit flies use distinct calling and courtship songs
• Dancing and foreplay: Spiders will dance, certain flies will do zig zag patterns in the air, certain insects will touch each others antennas as a type of foreplay
• Gifts: Some insects will capture food and present it to the female
• Pheromones: Certain pheromones will be released to trigger a mate attraction

Question 19

What are pheromones?

Answer 19

Pheromones are chemicals released by organisms that may evoke:

• Behavior responses
• Developmental responses
• Reproductive responses

Examples:

• Females in estrus will emit an odor that will drive animals mad trying to get to the female
• Ants and caterpillars will mark their path with pheromones
• Dogs marking their territory with pheromone laden urine

Question 20

What type of sexual relationships do we see with animals?

Answer 20

We see all types:

• monogamy
• polygamy
• polyandry
• often the relationships only last a single mating season

Question 21

What is Associative Learning?

Answer 21

Associative Learning is a type of learning in which one stimulus is linked to another through experience. It is a form of conditioning being learned and unlearned based upon the response it generates. There are two types of associative learning:

• Operant conditioning
• Classical conditioning

Question 22

What is operant conditioning?

Answer 22

Operant conditioning is trial and error learning where the animal learns to associate its behavior with a reward or punishment. This is the basis for most animal training

• Reward (Positive reinforcement): A rat presses a lever and food comes out or a dolphin gets a treat for jumping through the hoop
• Punishment (Negative reinforcement): A dog gets shocked by a shock collar when it barks

Question 23

What is classical conditioning?

Answer 23

Classical conditioning is where we form an association between two stimuli resulting in a learned response.

• Pavlovs’s dogs and the bell. As the bell was rung before food was presented, the bell began to be associated with food and a salivation response was noted
• Extinction: Eventually as he started ringing the bell and not bringing the food, the conditioned response disappeared.

Question 24

What is foraging behavior?

Answer 24

Foraging behavior is searching the wild for food resources. It includes eating and the way an animal searches for and captures food

• Genetics and environment both contribute to this behavior
• Foragers balance the risk of being killed by predators with their own metabolic needs
• Foraging can be:
• Individual: Capture and consume prey alone
• Group: capture and consume prey together
• Young animals can learn from the adults or their peers
• This is driven in a huge part by natural selection as only the activities that maximize energy return will be favored

Question 25

What is agonistic behavior?

Answer 25

Agonistic behavior is behavior related to fighting. It includes:

• Threats
• Displays
• Retreats
• Playing “nice”
• Making up

Question 26

Why do animals fight?

Answer 26

Animal fighting usually occurs due to two reasons:

• Resources: Food and territory
• Mate finding

Question 27

What do animals do to avoid the heavy cost of fighting?

Answer 27

Many animals have developed displays of power that they use to bluff aggression to scare another animal away without fighting

• An animal stands on its hind legs as an opponent nears
• A bird spreads its lower tail feathers and fluffs its feathers when its territory is breached
• A gorilla begins pounding on its chest as another gorilla approaches

Question 28

What is dominance hierarchy?

Answer 28

Dominance hierarchy is a social ranking system within a population.

• It can be changed if the dominant animal is challenged
• Higher ranking animals have more access to fertile females and partake in matings
• The main function is the maintenance of group stability
• Body size, which often correlates with fighting ability is an intrinsic factor in the establishment of a dominance hierarchy.

Question 29

What is altruistic behavior?

Answer 29

Altruistic behavior is when an animal risks its safety and life to protect and save the others

• The fitness of the group is increased at the expense of the individual animal
• When an animal helps another, it is almost always another relative
• A honeybee dies stinging a predator to save the hive

Question 30

If the individual dies, how did altruistic behavior evolve?

Answer 30

Altruistic behavior is usually only seen among relatives
- Close relatives have genes in common, thus altruism promotes the survival and transmission of those genes among the family unit. This is called kin selection

Question 31

What is kin selection?

Answer 31

Kin selection is when a family member sacrifices itself for the survival of the family and the genes that promoted that action are more likely to be passed on to those that survive, because they are related and have similar genes.

Question 32

What is biological fitness?

Answer 32

Biological fitness is the contribution that an individual makes to the gene pool, relative to the contributions of the other individuals in the population.
- Essentially, how your genes will affect the survival of your species within a population

Question 33

What is territoriality?

Answer 33

Territoriality is when an animal defends a specific sociogeographical area for purposes of:

• Nesting
• Mating
• Feeding
• Hunting
• Most vertebrates and some invertebrates exhibit territoriality behavior.
• Territories are defended through agonist behaviors

Question 34

What is an appeasement gesture?

Answer 34

An appeasement gesture is a display made by the weaker or subordinate individual that shows that it comes in peace and recognizes the dominant as such. Examples include:

• cowering
• whining
• presenting vulnerable areas