Development of behaviour Flashcards
Define ontogenetic adaptatoins
behavoiur at certain stages may be more/less adaptive to the animal’s current environment
- some changes contribute to fitness immdeiately, or later in life
- e.g. predator avoidance
- e.g. mate selection
Name five advantages of behaviural development
- more aware of environment
- more mobile
- spend less time with mother
- exposed to more changes
- learn about risks
What is behavioural develoment influenced by?
interplay of enetics and the environment
e.g. behaviour change of bees through out life cycle -genes -> transformation from nurse to forager
- environment -> pheromones from quen changes gene expression in workers
- internal -> juvenile hormone low levels in nurses blood, higher in foragers (young bees)
what has a big impac on behaviour?
environmetal conditions
How does a 2M female mouse (two males neigbouring in uterus) react to this constillation?
- less attractive to males
- more aggressive to female intrudeers
- more enivornmental marking
- larger home ranges
- delayed first oestrous
- produce fewer successful litters
give an example were social environments influence behavours long-term
e. g. pregnant guinea pigs living in unstable social environments, produced offspring with abnormal behaviours
- daughter: signals higher amounts of male-typical play and courtship, higher testosterone levels
- sons: more behaviours associated with very young guinea pigs, e.g. body contact resting; courship and pla intermixed
what are the two differing development states animals are born/hatch?
briefly describe them
altrical =to nourish
-relatively helpless
- often no/little fur’feathers
- can’t eat solid food
- incapable of locomotion
precocial = early ripening
-more advance state
- frequenctly able to eat some solids
- can move around independently
define imprinting
learning process whereby a young animal’s social preference becomes restricted to a specific stimulus/stimulus class
- filial imprinting
- sexual imprinting
(much of this work has been done with prococial species)
(duck imprinted on cat, duck imprinted on human)
What are Lorenz’s original thoughts on imprinting?
- different to other types of learning, not requiring reinfocement
- irreversible
- main funciton is to learn characteristics of future mates
- only occurs during ‘critical’ periods of develoment
What are the two types of imprinting?
describe them
1. Filial Imprinting: e.g. first stimulus that a bird will encounter upon hatching
2. sexual imprinting: ensures conspecific mate selection
- seperate process, later in development (my overlap)
- two-stage: early experiences learning characteristics of parents and siblings (‘acqusition’), and later exposure to a species when sexually mature (‘consolidation’)
Give two examples for experiments tat show maternal vocalisations influence young hatchlings’ behaviour
1. e.g. Gottlieb et al. (1960s-1970s), mallard ducks - relative importance of auditory vs visual cues
- 224 eggs, htched in incubator - not exposed to mother
- 4 groups, tested in arena with stuffed conspecific, various calls -> mallard most successful (% following)
2. Bolhuis & Bateson (1990) showed ther can be flexibility with filial imprinting (timing)
- test 1 = 3 days of exposure to either stimuli
- test 2 = re-tested after 3 days with OTHER stimulus
- test 3 = re-tested after 3 days with BOTH stimuli
-> unlikely to occur in nature
Give one example of cross fostering experiments that display sexual-imprinting
e.g. brood swithing amongs blue tits and great tits
Devine critical periods and sensitive periods
life stages whre there is differences in/sensitivity to external experiences have previously been desbribed as ‘critical periods’
timres arise when teher is increased sensitivity to certain experiences
Compare early and current believes of imprinitng
Early beliefes
- different to other types of learning, not requiring reinforcement
- irreversible
- main function is to learn characteristics of future mates
- only occurs during ‘critical’ periods of development
current:
- imprinting stmuli may be reinfocers (animals will work for visal access to these stimuli)
- not necessary irreversible, unlikely in real life
- sexual imprinting is a spererate process
- periods of development redefined as sensitive, important periods
What is Goodenough’s, (2010) definition of ‘developmental homeostasis’?
The ability of developmental processes to buffer themselves against potentially harmful influences to produce functional adults
