Behavioral Ecology

Question 1

What is a behavior?

Answer 1

A behavior is the nervous system’s response to a stimulus and is carried out by the muscular or the hormonal system.

Question 2

How is communication defined?

Answer 2

Communication is the transmission and reception of signals between animals.

Question 3

What controls the mating behavior of flies?

Answer 3

The transcription factor fruitless (fru) has male and female splice variants. This master regulatory gene controls mating behavior.

Question 4

How does a single gene (fru) control mating behavior in flies?

Answer 4

Males lacking fruM don’t court.
Male splice variants in females can cause sex role reversal (as do female splice variants in males)

Question 5

What is foraging?

Answer 5

Food-obtaining behavior, includes recognizing, searching for, capturing, and eating food items.

Question 6

What is mate choice?

Answer 6

The act of choosing a reproductive partner.

Question 7

What is social behavior?

Answer 7

Interactions with kin and conspecifics (members of the same species).

Question 8

What four questions did Niko Tinbergen ask about animal behavior?

Answer 8

1. What stimulus elicits the behavior, and what physiological mechanisms mediate the response?
2. How does the animal’s experience during growth and development influence the response?
3. How does the behavior aid survival and reproduction?
4. What is the behavior’s evolutionary history?

Question 9

What is ethology?

Answer 9

The science and study of animal behavior.

Question 10

What is behavioral ecology?

Answer 10

The study of the ecological and evolutionary basis for animal behavior.

Question 11

What is a fixed action pattern?

Answer 11

A sequence of unlearned acts that are directly linked to an external cue called a sign stimulus.

Question 12

What is migration?

Answer 12

A regular, long-distance change in location guided by environmental cues. Animals can orient themselves through unfamiliar territory using their position relative to the sun, the North Star, and earth’s magnetic field.

Question 13

What is foraging behavior?

Answer 13

Foraging behavior includes all the methods by which an organism acquires and utilizes sources of energy and nutrients.

Question 14

What is the tradeoff animals must make to maximize fitness?

Answer 14

There is a tradeoff between high growth (advantages of body size) and high reproduction (advantages of birth rate). Animals must allocate energy to one or the other.

Question 15

What is monogamy?

Answer 15

One male mates with one female. Males and females typically have similar external morphologies.

Question 16

What is polygamy?

Answer 16

An individual of one sex mates with several individuals of the other sex.

Question 17

What is polygyny?

Answer 17

A form of polygamy where one male mates with many females. Males are usually more show and larger than the females.

Question 18

What is polyandry?

Answer 18

A form of polygamy where one female mates with many males. Females are often more showy than the males.

Question 19

What does the type of mating system that occurs depend on?

Answer 19

1. Whether 1 or 2 parents can effectively raise offspring.
2. Whether mates are clumped or dispersed and can be economically defended.

Question 20

Describe the mating and frequency dependence of side-blotched lizards.

Answer 20

Males have either an orange, blue, or yellow throat. Each color is associated with a specific strategy for obtaining mates. The success of each strategy depends on the frequencies of all of the strategies; this drives frequency-dependent selection.

Question 21

What is the strategy of orange-throated side-blotched male lizards?

Answer 21

They are the most aggressive and defend large territories.

Question 22

What is the strategy of blue-throated side-blotched male lizards?

Answer 22

They defend small territories.

Question 23

What is the strategy of yellow-throated side-blotched male lizards?

Answer 23

They are non-territorial, mimic females, and use “sneaky” strategies to mate.

Question 24

How does cooperation occur?

Answer 24

Natural selection favors behaviors that maximize an individual’s survival and reproduction–these behaviors are often selfish. But animals also cooperate when there is a direct mutual fitness benefit, such as in group foraging, group defense, and reproducing in groups.

Question 25

What is altruism in the context of animal behavior?

Answer 25

On occasion, some animals behave in ways that reduce their individual fitness but increase the fitness of others.