Lecture Review: Behavioral Ecology

A comprehensive set of vocabulary flashcards covering key concepts in behavioral ecology, including mating systems, altruism, learning, and evolutionary causes of behavior.

Behavioral ecology

The scientific discipline that studies how behavior develops, evolves, and contributes to survival and reproductive success.

Behavior

The actions or reactions of an individual or a group in response to external or internal stimuli.

Proximate questions

Mechanistic "how" questions concerned with environmental stimuli, genetics, and physiological mechanisms underlying a behavior.

Ultimate questions

Evolutionary "why" questions addressing the significance of a behavior and why it is favored by natural selection.

Culture

A system of information transfer through social learning or teaching that can alter behavioral phenotypes and influence fitness.

Mate choice copying

A behavior in which individuals, such as the guppy Poecilia reticulata, copy the mate choices made by others in the population.

Sociobiology

A discipline emphasizing that certain behavioral characteristics result from genes perpetuated by natural selection, famously discussed by E. O. Wilson in 1975.

Inclusive fitness

The total effect an individual has on proliferating its genes by reproducing and by helping relatives raise offspring.

Hamilton's rule

The quantitative measure predicting natural selection favors altruism when $rB > C$, where $r$ is relatedness, $B$ is benefit, and $C$ is cost.

Coefficient of relatedness

Represented by $r$, the probability that a gene in one individual is inherited from a common ancestor by a second individual.

Kin selection

The mechanism of inclusive fitness where individuals increase their genetic representation by helping relatives raise young.

Reciprocal altruism

The exchange of aid between unrelated individuals, adaptive if the favor is likely to be returned in the future.

Tit for tat

A behavioral strategy in game theory where an individual mimics the previous action of their opponent, starting with cooperation.

Altruism

Behavior that appears to decrease an individual's own fitness while increasing the fitness of others.

Optimal foraging theory

A model viewing foraging as a compromise between nutritional benefits and the costs of obtaining food, such as energy use and predation risk.

Promiscuous

A mating system with no strong pair-bond or lasting relationships between males and females.

Monogamous

A mating system where one male mates with one female.

Polygyny

A polygamous relationship involving one male and many females.

Polyandry

A polygamous relationship involving one female and many males.

Sexual selection

A form of natural selection where differences in reproductive success result from differences in mating success.

Intersexual selection

A type of selection where members of one sex choose mates based on specific characteristics, such as plumage or songs.

Intrasexual selection

Competition among members of the same sex for access to mates.

Innate behavior

Behavior that is developmentally fixed and under strong genetic influence, regardless of environmental differences.

Kinesis

A simple movement characterized by a change in activity or turning rate in response to a stimulus.

Taxis

An automatic, oriented movement toward or away from a stimulus, such as positive rheotaxis in stream fish.

Pheromones

Chemical substances, common in insects and mammals, used for communication regarding reproduction or alarm responses.

Spatial learning

Modification of behavior based on experience with the spatial structure of the environment, often involving landmarks.

Cognitive map

An internal code or representation of the spatial relationships between objects in an animal's environment.

Associative learning

The ability of an animal to learn to link one stimulus with another, such as linking a certain color with a bad taste.

Classical conditioning

A type of associative learning where an arbitrary stimulus becomes associated with a particular outcome.

Operant conditioning

Also called trial-and-error learning, where an animal associates its own behavior with a reward or punishment.

Cognition

The ability of an animal's nervous system to perceive, store, process, and use information gathered by sensory receptors.