Cause, Function and Development of Animal Behaviour

Question 1

What are the functional attributes of animal behaviour?

Answer 1

• nutrient capture
• body maintenance
  -reproduction

Question 2

What are Tinburgens four questions?

Answer 2

• function
• evolution
• causation
• development

Question 3

What is the evolution of behaviour based on?

Answer 3

• behaviour affects the survival and/or reproduction of the individual
• Behaviour is variable and is affected/ determined by genes
• behaviour genes are heritable

Question 4

What is domestication?

Answer 4

Process by which a population of animals becomes adapted to man and to the captive environment by some combination of genetic changes and environmentally enduced developmental events during each generation

Question 5

What is the primary effect of domestication on behaviour?

Answer 5

-species dependent
- loss of traits and/or exaggeration of traits

Question 6

What are the pre-adaptations for domestication?

Answer 6

• large gregarious social groups with a dominance hierarchy
• non aggressive
• Promiscuous mating (sexual signals by movement or posture rather than by colour or morphology)
  -Precocial young (leave the nest once)/ easily separated from parents
• temperament
• limited agility
• generalist feeder

Question 7

Reasons to domesticate animals?

Answer 7

recognised human need
- control of food production
- clothing, labour, transport
- religious
- protection

Question 8

What are the approaches to study the effects of domestication on behaviour?

Answer 8

• Comparison of wild and domestic stock
• Hybridisation
• Domestication genes

Question 9

How does domestication accelerate sexual maturation?

Answer 9

• selection under the domestic environment
• absence of social competition from older, dominant animals