Responses to the Environment

Unit 8 Overview

Focus on responses to the environment in animals.

Topics include animal behavior, biodiversity, and human impacts on the environment.

Key Questions for Reflection

How do animal behaviors arise?

What purpose do these behaviors serve?

Focus will be on these questions throughout this unit.

Historical Context

Behavioral ecology origins traced back to the 1930s with scientists: Tinbergen, Lorenz, Von Frisch.

They won Nobel Prize in 1970s for work in ethology (study of behavior).

Prior to their work, understanding of animal behavior was limited.

Ethology

Defined as the study of how evolutionary processes shape inherited behaviors.

Two main aspects of ethology:

• Evolutionary processes (natural selection) shape behaviors that enhance survival/reproduction.
• Responses to stimuli vary across species, shaped through evolutionary history.

Behavior Definition

Behavior: an animal's response to a stimulus (can be internal or external).

Discussion of the nature vs. nurture debate regarding behavior:

• Nature: Genetic influence
• Nurture: Environmental influence
• Most behaviors are influenced by a combination of both.

Advances in Neuroscience

Enhanced understanding of underlying mechanisms influencing behavior.

Four core questions in ethology (by early researchers):

1. What mechanisms trigger specific behavioral responses?
2. How does behavior develop as the animal matures?
3. What is the ecological function of the behavior?
4. How did the behavior evolve?

Causes of Behavior

Distinction between proximate cause and ultimate cause:

• Proximate Cause: How a behavior occurs or is modified.
• Involves stimuli causing behavior and how experiences affect responses.
• Ultimate Cause: Why a behavior occurs (natural selection context).
• Explains behavioral adaptation for survival and reproduction and evolution's impact on behaviors.

Example Application - Zebras

Scenario of zebras drinking at a water hole highlighted:

• Proximate Cause: Warning call triggers running away.
• Ultimate Cause: Increases chance of survival after running away from potential danger.

Innate vs. Learned Behavior

House finch singing example discusses the debate:

• Innate Behaviors: Hereditary, instinctive, no learning required.
• Learned Behaviors: Influenced by environmental stimuli; dependent on experience.
• Behaviors often show interaction between innate and learned components.

FRQ Practice

Exercise on designing an experiment to test whether house finch song is innate or learned.

Requirements for hypothesis formulation:

• Hypothesis identification (null & alternative).
• Define independent and dependent variables, controls, and constants.
• Overview of experimental design and data collection.
• Interpretation of results in relation to hypothesis justification.