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Intro to animal behavior,
What is Behavior?
It is tricky to define, but is comprised of the following: movement, social interaction, cognition (thought and understanding), learning and memory.
Basically, any observable action or response an animal makes to the stimuli in its environment.
What does behavior encompass?
-Movement
-Social interaction
-Cognition (thought and understanding)
-Learning and memory
Four central questions in the study of animal behavior
1.) What is the mechanism (causation) that produces a behavior?
(Ex: Birdsong in male songbirds… they sing bc hormonal influences and learning.)
2.) (Ontogeny) How does a behavior develop?
(Ex: Human speech… we learn to speak through feedback, interaction, and listening.)
3.) (Utility) What is the survival value of a behavior?
(Ex: Mating displays in male birds… the better fit he is, his genetic material will continue)
4.) How did the behavior evolve from an ancestral state?
(Ex: Tool use in chimpanzees… over time, natural selection favored chimps that could use tools to acquire food.)
How has the field of animal behavior changed over the years?
Ancient studies = Aristotle → Victorian/Edwardian = anthropomorphism, Charles Darwin, Charles Henry Turner → Early 20th century = Behaviorists, external manifestations of behavior in experiments to test hypotheses.
Compare approaches of comparative psychologists to those of the ethologists
-Comparative psychologists = Analyzing animal behavior in highly controlled lab settings
-Ethologists = Analyzing animal behavior in natural environments.
Just-so Story
In science, it’s an untestable narrative explanation for a trait or behavior. Whereas everything should be tested.
Evolution
Change in heritable traits of a group of organisms over successive generations.
Natural Selection
Organisms better adapted to their environment tend to survive and produce more offspring (one mechanism of evolution)
Fitness
Relative ability to produce offspring in the next generation.
Co-opted Trait
Trait that served a different initial function than it does now.
Proximate questions/hypothesis
“How”, relates to function, mechanism, or how something develops over the life of an animal.
Ulitmate questions/hypothesis
Why”, relates to evolution, phylogeny (evolutionary history), or the adaptiveness of a trait in the context of its environment.
Aristotle
Opened the debate if some animals are capable of mental time travel?
Charles Darwin
Put great weight into the evolutionary history of animals. Opened the nature v. nurture debate, in which he heavily favored nature.
Charles Henry Turner
One of the first black researchers in animal behavior. Showed that insects can learn.
Anthropomorphism
The attribution of human characteristics to an animal.
Applied Animal Behavior
Focused on improving the welfare and care of animals.
Ethogram
A categorical list of defined behaviors.
Scan Sampling
Recording behaviors in the ethogram that were being performed at specific intervals of time.
How is behavior regulated across different timescales?
Long-term behavioral states (endocrine) influence and constrain short-term actions (neural).
Different forms of control can modulate or adjust behavior in response to changes in conditions.
What’s the difference between endocrine and neural control?
-Endocrine: Long-term, slower, utilizes hormones for more widespread effects. Energy efficient.
-Neural: Short-term, faster, utilizes neurons. Energy expensive.
What’s the path information takes through the nervous system to translate external information to behavioral responses?
Stimulus → Sensory Receptor → Sensory neuron → Central Nervous System (CNS) → motor neuron (muscles) → Effector/response
What factors affect the speed an action potential travels down an axon?
-Having a greater diameter
-Having a myelin sheath (the protective layer that encapsulates the axons)
Which hormones mediate courtship/reproduction, parental care, hunger/feeding/foraging, and flight or fight response, and stress in vertebrates?
-Courtship/reproduction = Estrogen, Testosterone
-Parental Care = Progesterone, Oxytocin, Vasopressin, Proiactin
-Hunger/feeding/foraging = Insulin
-Flight or fight = Adrenaline/Epinephrine
-Stress = Cortisol
Which two hormones are responsible for a vast array of insect behaviors and metamorphic prcresses?
Juvenile hormone and Ecdysone
What’s the bias we have regarding animal sensory perception?
Anthropomorphism and assuming that animals have similar sensory abilities to us humans.
How can single-trait breeding programs alter domestic animal behavior?
Loss of genetic diversity due to inbreeding and can select for increased aggression (unintended behavioral issues).
How can scientists test evolutionary hypotheses by combining genetically derived phylogenies and behavioral phenotype data?
Using genomic data and mapping behavioral traits onto phylogenies.
What organs are involved in regulating behavior?
Nervous, endocrine, and sensory at different levels.
Neuron
Cell especially adapted to generate an electrical signal, most often in the form of an action potential.
Neurotransmitter
Moves quickly across synapses, increases in the number and size of synapses are associated with making long-term memories, changes in neurotransmitter chemistry associated with short-term memory, action potentials are energy expensive, but fast.
A small molecule that carries messages among neurons and between the nervous system and other tissues (sensory cells, muscles, etc.)
Endocrine Glands
Secrete hormones into extracellular fluids, from which they quickly diffuse into nearby blood capillaries.
Hormones
chemicals produced and released by endocrine cells… more energy-efficient for long-term continuous control.
Modulation
The ability of a factor to change a behavior along a range of possible responses.
Sensory Receptor Cell
cell that is specialized at transforming the energy of a stimulus into an electrical signal.
Sensory cells (peripheral nervous system)
Gather information about the environment and transmit that information via the axons of afferent neurons to the central nervous system
Central Nervous System (CNS)
Processes the information, then sends signals via efferent nerves that innervate muscles, creating observable actions (behaviors).
In most animals, this system includes the brain and central nerve cord (spinal cord in vertebrates).
Olfactory Epithelium
Thin, cellular tissue that runs along the roof of the nasal cavity.
Artificial Selection
Selective breeding by humans to favor certain traits
Single-trait Breeding Programs
Often create unintended behavioral issues.
Ex: ~30 yrs ago, breeding programs aimed to develop faster-growing and bigger chickens unintentionally bred roosters that attacked and killed hens instead of engaging in normal courtship behavior.
Extended Phenotypes
Manifestations of genes that occur outside of the organism that possess those genes. It can affect the organism’s social partners, physical environment, or other species.
Ex: Nest-building
What is learning and how does it enable animals to cope with unpredictable environments?
Learning is the modification of behavior due to stored information from previous experience.
Learning enables quick response to these changes within the animal's lifetime.
What brain regions are thought to be associated with memory?
Vertebrates: Amygdala, cerebral cortex, and hippocampus.
*In insects: Kenyon cells of mushroom bodies
What physiological, and neural changes mechanistically underlie learning and memory? Which are associated with different types of memory?
Synaptic plasticity underlies learning and memory, as they strengthen or weaken in response to activity.
Weak = short-term memory
Strength = long-term memory
Difference between associative and non-associative learning?
-Associative= Animals to learn to associate a stimulus, or their stimulus response, to a positive or negative outcomes. Ex: conditioning
-Non-associative= learning that occurs without this association… no response to a stimulus
How does habituation and sensitization help animals sort between important and unimportant information?
By decreasing response to repeated, non-threatening stimuli. Meanwhile, sensitization enhances the response to dangerous stimuli.
How does conditioning allow for animals to adaptively respond to repeated experiences?
Enables them to learn associations between stimuli in their environment.
What is social learning and what are some examples?
The process of acquiring knowledge and skills by observing and intimidating the behaviors of others (learning through social interaction).
Ex: Woodpeckers watching where another woodpecker places its food to steal it.
Behavioral plasticity
a change in an organism’s behavior that results from exposure to changes in stimuli/environment.
Phenotypic plasticity
changes in an organism’s behavior, morphology or physiology in response to changes in stimuli/environment.
Learning
The modification of behavior due to stored information from previous experience (a type of behavioral and phenotypic plasticity).
When an animal’s environment is stable/predictable from generation to generation…
highly fixed (genetically based) behaviors are effective.
When an animal’s environment is unstable/difficult to predict…
learning enables quick response to these changes within the animal's lifetime.
A “steep learning curve” means
learning with relatively fewer attempts, less efforts, or less time.
Short-term Memory
Last seconds to minutes, “working memory” or “electrical memory”, limited capacity (less than 6-7 elements for most animals)
Ex: a coyote sees a mouse run under a bush and remembers it is there while stalking it.
Synthesis of short-lived proteins within neurons= Cyclic adensosine monophosphate (cAMP), a messenger… protein kinase, an enzyme involved in protein synthesis
Long-term Memory
Lasting weeks to months.
Ex: a coyote remembers where a stream is in the environment so that it can continue to find water.
Also relies on kinases, growth of synaptic connections and adding of new connections. Bigger synapses function more efficiently (essential for recall of long-term memory)
Why have both?
It’s costly to form long-term memories (energetically, and capacity-wise). It is adaptive to forget types of information not likely to be useful in the future. Long-term and short-term memory gets handled a little differently.
Reinforcement
Encourages long-lasting memory. Anything that increases the probability of a behavior.
Imprinting
The learning of a critical feature in the environment at a young age (such as the identity of a parent or a migration route) and retaining this knowledge for later use.
Critical Period
A narrow window; animal is highly sensitive to environmental stimuli and experiences.
Habituation
The loss of response to a stimulus when the stimulus is given repeatedly.
Ex: Jane Goodall and chimps
Sensitization
An increase in responsiveness to a stimulus due to experience with that stimulus.
Latent Inhibition (LI)
Exposure to a stimulus without consequence retards subsequent response to a stimulus.
-Animals with low LI tend don’t tend to habituate as readily, they are worse at “filtering out” irrelevant information.
Classical Conditioning
In which the subject has no control over their environment.
Ex: Pavlov’s dogs learned to associate a bell with food by repeated exposure. They would salivate at the stimulus of the bell, even when food was absent.
Conditioning
the building of a learned association between two events (also known as associative learning)
Operant Conditioning
Where via associations, the subject learns to manipulate its environment to produce its desired outcome.
Ex: Skinner’s rats.
Positive
applying a stimulus
Negative
Removing a stimulus
Reinforcement
Something that increases a behavior
Punishment
Something that decreases a behavior
Trial and Error Learning
subject attempts a series of solutions to a problem, eliminating possible solutions that do not work.
-Can be costly in some situations, depending on how expensive an “error” is.
Taste Aversion Learning
there is high selection pressure on learning to avoid toxic food items. In many animals, vomiting can cause the formation of strong, long-lasting memories that result in that animal avoiding these types of food long into the future.
Caching
a cache is a store of (usually food) resources. Animals that cache usually have good episodic memory or memory that is attached to or associated with specific experiences or events in the animal’s life. Each “caching” event is an “episode”.
Reforaging
an animal puts food in its home range but doesn’t actually remember where a specific term is.
Searching by rule
food is cached using specific rules that can be used to find them later.
Ex: food is always cached under rocks of a certain size.
Migration
learning migration routes is a common form of social learning seen in migratory birds.
What is cognition? Why is it hard to define/test? Why is it worth studying?
Is difficult to define because it is a general term used to encompass a variety of experiences and thoughts. Like… attention, language, learning, memory, perception, and thought. It’s hard to test because you don’t want to stress or manipulate the animal.
It’s worth studying because it better helps us understand another animal and how they interact with their environment.
How has assumptions about animal cognition have changed in the past 150 years?
Early animal behaviorists assumed that all animals think and feel the same way we do. Criticism of this approach caused the field to assume the opposite for a long time, that animals do not have cognition.
In the past 30 yrs, we have strong evidence suggesting that animals have a diversity of cognitive strategies, some like our own, some quite different
Different aspects of animal cognition and how scientists have tried to estimate them.
Attempt at a neutral list: Self-awareness, forecasting, problem-solving, empathy, thinking, intuition, and insight.
How scientists have tried to estimate them: fMRI tests (comparisons of brain activity), mirror tests, etc.
How does cognition relate to intelligence, language, problem-solving, and mental time travel?
Cognition allows animals to gain memory, learn, and gain decision-making skills, which allows for intelligence, language, problem-solving, and mental time travel. Thus, allowing them to navigate their environment and respond flexibly to challenges.
What factors evolutionarily select for high animal intelligence?
-Predation; must make rapid decisions and be able to avoid detection.
-Sociality; recognition, social hierarchy, individual ID memory
fMRI (Functional Magnetic Resonance Imagining)
Tests for cognition. Comparisons of human and primate brain activity, similar regions of the brain activated by similar stimuli indicates similar cognition. Some insights from this technique: numerical reasoning in corvids, rats, and primates… and jealously processed similarly in dogs and humans.
Language
abstract, symbolic representation of ideas used for communication.
-Cognition does not require language, but highly symbolic, complex language in an animal suggests “high cognitive ability”.
-Three key attributes of complex language: the ability to assign meaning to symbols with no direct relationship to that which is represented (this distinguishes language from ritualized displays), the ability to make novel combinations of those symbols to suit particular communication needs, and the use of grammatical rules (syntax)
The Concept of Self-Mind vs. Body
Regardless of language, there is evidence that many animals can at least partly separate their thoughts from their bodily experience and can distinguish “self” from “others”.
Studies of how animals perceive themselves and others involve discussions of self-awareness and theory of mind like mirror tests.
Self Awareness
the ability to assess one’s own condition and to contrast that condition with the states of other animals in the population.
Theory of Mind
the ability to form hypotheses about the thoughts of other animals in the population.
Mirror Tests
-An early method for assessing an animal’s perception of self. Do they recognize themselves in the mirror? Put a mark on the animal’s face, do they touch the mirror or themselves?
-Negative results don’t mean no self-awareness: only works for highly visual animals, context matters for many species (ex: elephants), and animal may recognize themselves but show no sign.
Gaze-Following
Another measure of an animal’s ability to separate “self” from “others”. Is the ability to follow the line of someone else’s vision (to “see what they see”). It implies theory of mind.
Mental Time Travel
thinking about the past and using that information to form plans for the future. A particular type of learning and applying knowledge that involves putting yourself mentally in that future or past experience.
-Animals capable of mental time travel must be chronesthetic, that is, they must have awareness of the past, present, and future. Testing for chromesthesia is complicated.
Semantic Memory
memory of abstract concepts and representations (ex: language)
Procedural Memory
memory of a specific series of steps to a task.
Episodic Memory
Memories related to specific events. Episodic memory enables cognitive activities such as reflection and forecasting.
Time-place Learning
Associating consequences or rewards with a specific time and place, and using that information to return to that place in the future. Lots of animals have time-place learning, which doesn’t necessarily require episodic memory/mental time travel, but it is important. Falls short of implying cognition because it lacks evidence of mental reflection.
Counting
Not cognition itself, but the ability to assess more or less and to predict future rewards is cognition.
Intelligence
Quickness to learn, ability to retain information, and facility in problem-solving.
Environments of Evolutionary Adaptiveness
Specific set of historical and ecological conditions in which a species evolved and adapted over time.
Social Brain Hypothesis
Suggests that social animals must be more highly intelligent due to the higher demands of survival in social groups.
What is information theory? How do you interpret changes in uncertainty in the context of animal communication?
-Information theory: We can measure the flow of information by analyzing changes in the uncertainty of the receiver’s behaviors according to what the sender does.
Give examples of the different types of communication based on sender and receiver identity or based on fitness effects to the sender and reciever.
-Autocommunication = communication with oneself
-Social communication = communication between animals of the same species.
-Ecological/intraspecific communication = communication between animals of different species
What’s the difference between a cue, a signal, and a display?
-Cue: Any type of information in the environment that an animal uses to change its behavior. It may or may not come from another animal. Ex: position in the sun in the sky is a cue for honeybee orientation.
-Signal: information intentionally flowing from a sender to a receiver. Ex: neck color in European house sparrows is an honest signal of male fitness.
-Display: highly ritualized signals that have been shaped evolutionarily to make the transmitted information easier for the receiver to understand. Attention based! GIVE ME ATTENTION RECEIVER!
