4.

Scientists studying scrub jays found that it is common for helpers to assist
mated pairs of birds in raising their young. The helpers lack territories and mates of
their own. Instead, they help the territory owners gather food for their offspring.
Helpers are usually fledglings from the same family and stay and help for a year
before mating.

A) Propose a hypothesis to explain what advantage there might be for the

helpers to engage in this behavior instead of seeking their own territories and
mates.
When scrub jays dont have mates or territories and are less likely to survive alone, they display
altruistic behavior and increase inclusive fitness (the fitness of the individual plus the fitness of
relatives) by becoming helpers in order to increase their chance of survival.

B) How would you test your hypothesis?

In order to test this hypothesis an experiment with three fenced areas with scrub jays
must be set up. In this experiment survival factor of scrub jays would be the independent
variable, and the amount of helpers present in each environment would be the dependent
variable. For the purpose of this environment survival factors shall be defined as
aspects in an organisms environment that its survival is contingent upon. The survival
factor present in this experiment will be the presence of predators. Common predators of
scrub jays are snakes. In environment one, a natural environment will be simulated by
recreating the amount of snakes in the area naturally. This environment will be the
control to show the natural depiction. Environment 2 will have an increased amount of
snakes present, but will be an otherwise similar environment to environment 1.
Environment 3 will have no snakes present but will be otherwise similar to environment 1
and 2. If the hypothesis proves correct the amount of helpers present will be most in
environment 2, 1, and 3 will have the least. The amount of helpers will be observed at the
end of each week for a 1 year period in each environment.