Chapter 9 Flashcards
Behavior
Study of individual animals
Benefits of living in groups
They interact with other Animals and plants. Influences fitness.
Natural selection
If I do this I will live longer N RAIse more offspring and spread my genes
Group defense
One benefit Of living in groups. Scare away large predators when In groups rather than in one
Increased vigilance
Benefit of living in group. In group they can eat more seeds cuz less time looking for predators and more time eating,
If living in large groups has costs and benefits, under what conditions would natural selection favor group living?
Animals generally form groups to increase their survival, rate of feeding, or success in finding mates.
Survival: While a single individual might not be able to fend off the attack of a predator, a group of individuals can be quite effective at doing so
Feeding: Living in groups can also help animals locate and consume resources
Mates: Socializing can also provide mating benefits by making it easier to locate potential mates
Why might individuals give up defending territories if the density of their population increases?
As long as a resource can be defended and the benefits of defending the resource outweigh the costs, animals are likely to maintain territories. the largest males defend the largest territories and males with the largest territories have access to the greatest number of females. Individuals will give up defending territories when its too costly against the greater number of individuals of the same species.
Explain the costs and benefits that might influence the optimal flock size in birds.
Cost- There’s increased competition for food and higher chance of being seen by predator if they are in a big group
Cost- more competition for resources (food/space)
Benefits - more chance of mating and spreading genes
compare and contrast the conditions under which natural selection favors cooperative versus altruistic behavior.
Cooperation is When both the donor and the recipient of a social behavior experience increased fitness from an interaction. Ex. lions teaming up to kill gazelle then sharing meat with other lions
Altruism is when a social interaction that increases the fitness of the recipient and decreases the fitness of the donor. Ex. worker bees providing for queen bee.
Natural selection favors cooperative behavior over altruistic because the individual gains something, while altruistic it’s a loss. Cooperative longer survival and more offsprings for both.
Cooperative behavior is when the donor and the recipient both experience increased fitness from the interaction. Altruistic behavior is when fitness of the recipient increases, but fitness of the donor decreases. Natural selection can favor cooperative behavior when acquiring enough food resources for both individuals results in longer survival and more offspring for both. Natural selection favors altruistic behavior its relative are closely related.
How could helping raise the offspring of another couple improve the helper’s fitness if the helper is not related?
Helpers in cooperatively breeding species may gain direct fitness benefits that increase their survival probability and/or reproductive success. kin selection helps us understand how cooperative breeding can be favored by natural selection. kin selection favoring cooperation, such as cooperative breeding by nonrelatives, highlights that relatedness is not the only factor that we need to consider
Why are selfish behaviors less favored when the donor and recipient are related to each other?
Selfishness is When the donor of a social behavior experiences increased fitness and the recipient experiences decreased fitness. Selfish behaviors are less favored when donor and recipient are related because it causes an indirect reduction in fitness for the donor.
Compare the coefficient of relatedness between brothers and sisters in diploid organisms with that of haplodiploid organisms
0.5 for brother and sister diploid and 0.25 for brother and sister haplodiploid. In haplodiploid organisms brothers and sisters are less closely related than in diploid organisms.
What evidence is there that a haplodiploid sex- determination system is not required for the evolution of eusociality?
many haplodiploid species are not eusocial, and some eusocial species—such as termites and naked mole rats—are not haplodiploid. Based on these observations, we are able to conclude that while being haplodiploid appears to favor the evolution of eusocial behavior by providing large indirect fitness effects when workers do not breed and instead help their sisters, being haplodiploid is not required for the evolution of eusocial behavior.
Why might selection based on groups of domesticated goats result in greater meat production than selection on individual goats?
Domesticated goats provide meat, milk, clothing. group living have helped breed more productive domesticated animals. for example, the heritability of survival for an individual can be quite low, but the heritability of survival when social interactions are included can be two to three times higher because social interactions affect survival.
Provide a hypothesis for how a plant attacked by an herbivore could communicate to conspecifics which species of herbivore is attacking?
the underlying mechanism is that attacked plants release chemicals when they are attacked; nearby plants can detect these chemicals and respond by increasing their own defenses.
Plants respond to herbivore attack through an intricate and dynamic defense system that includes structural barriers, toxic chemicals, and attraction of natural enemies of the target pests
