Domestication and Domestic Animals (Video)

Vocabulary flashcards covering key concepts, terms, and facts from the lecture on domestication and domestic animals.

Domestic animal

An animal kept, bred in captivity near human habitation, used for human advantage, with breeding and survival controlled by humans.

Domestication

The process by which wild animals are transformed to life under human control, kept for a purpose, and become dependent on humans.

Selective breeding (artificial selection)

Humans repeatedly breed individuals with desirable traits to enhance those traits in offspring.

Feral

Descended from domesticated species but living in the wild; not fully wild and not currently under human care.

Wild

Animals that have never been domesticated and live free from human intervention.

Precocial

Offspring that are relatively mature and mobile at birth and can feed themselves soon after.

Altricial

Offspring that are underdeveloped at birth and require substantial parental care.

Flight distance

The distance at which an animal starts to flee from a approaching human; shorter distances favor domestication.

Generalist diet

An adaptable diet that includes a wide range of foods, aiding domestication and captivity.

Domestication criteria

Traits that make domestication possible, including group living, flexible mating, low aggression, and tolerance of humans.

Group structure suitability

Ability to form large, non-territorial, hierarchically organized social groups—favorable for domestication.

Paedomorphosis

Retention of juvenile traits into adulthood, such as neotenous appearance and playfulness, commonly seen in domesticated animals.

Domestication syndrome

A suite of correlated changes (behavioral, morphological, and color variation) that occur with domestication.

Brain size reduction

Domesticated animals tend to have smaller brains than their wild relatives, especially in areas tied to fear and processing outside stimuli.

Two waves of cat domestication

Cat domestication occurred in two phases: near the Near East with farming, and later in ancient Egypt, spreading to Europe.

Dmitry Belayev fox experiment

1950s study selecting foxes for tameness, which produced rapid behavioral and physical changes, suggesting tameness can drive domestication.

First domesticated animals timeline

Domestication began over 10,000 years ago with dogs, followed by sheep, goats, pigs, and cattle; horses and cats were domesticated later.

Reasons for domestication (historical)

Animals were kept for food, clothing, labor (draft work), ritual/religion, status, and companionship.