Chapter 51

Animal
Behavior

Lecture Presentations by
Nicole Tunbridge and
© 2017 Pearson Education, Inc.
Kathleen Fitzpatrick
Concept 51.1: Discrete sensory inputs can
stimulate both simple and complex behaviors

 Behavioral ecology is the study of the ecological

and evolutionary basis for animal behavior
 A fixed action pattern is a sequence of unlearned
acts directly linked to a simple stimulus
 Fixed action patterns are unchangeable and, once
initiated, usually carried to completion
 A fixed action pattern is triggered by an external cue
known as a sign stimulus

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Fixed Action Patterns an example

 In male stickleback fish, the stimulus for attack

behavior is the red underside of an intruder
 Males will not attack fish lacking red coloration, but
they will attack even unrealistic models that have
areas of red color
 Goose eggs

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Migration

 Migration is a regular, long-distance change in

location
 Animals can orient themselves using their position
relative to
 The sun, using their circadian clock to adjust for
changes in its position
 The North Star
 Earth’s magnetic field

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Behavioral Rhythms

 Some animal behavior is affected by the animal’s

circadian rhythm, a daily cycle of rest and activity
 Behaviors such as migration and reproduction are
linked to changing seasons, or a circannual rhythm
 Periods of daylight and darkness are common
seasonal cues
 Some behaviors are linked to lunar cycles, which
affect tidal movements

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Animal Signals and Communication

 In behavioral ecology, a signal is a stimulus

transmitted from one organism to another
 Communication is the transmission and reception
of signals between animals
 Animals communicate using visual, chemical, tactile,
and auditory signals

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Forms of Animal Communication: Bees

 The angle of the straight run of the dance relative to

the vertical surface of the hive indicates the direction
of the food source
 Distance to the food source is indicated by the
length of the straight run and the number of
abdominal waggles
 If food is less than 50 m away, the bee simply moves
in tight circles while moving its abdomen side to side
 Bee dance

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Honeybee Dance Language

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Pheromones

 Animals that communicate through odors or tastes

emit chemical substances called pheromones
 For example, when a minnow or catfish is injured, an
alarm substance in the fish’s skin disperses in the
water, inducing a fright response among fish in the
area
 Pheromones can be effective at very low
concentrations

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Minnows Responding to the Presence of an Alarm Substance

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Concept 51.2: Learning establishes specific
links between experience and behavior
 Innate behavior is developmentally fixed and does
not vary among individuals
 Learning is the modification of behavior based on
specific experiences
 Research into learning seeks to understand the
contributions of both nature and nurture in shaping
learning and behavior

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Imprinting

 Imprinting is the establishment of a long-lasting

behavioral response to a particular individual or
object
 Imprinting can only take place during a specific time
in development called the sensitive period
 For example, in gulls, the sensitive period lasts one to
two days
 Offspring and parents must bond with each other
during this time or the parent will reject the offspring

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 Imprinting: Continued
 Many species of waterfowl
have no innate recognition of
“mother”; they identify with the
first object they encounter:
 For example, the imprint
stimulus in young greylag
geese is any nearby object
that is moving away from
them
 If their first exposure is to a
human, they will imprint on
the human and not recognize
their biological mother
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Imprinting
 Conservation biologists
have taken advantage of
imprinting in programs
to save endangered
species
 For example, young
whooping cranes
imprint on humans in
“crane suits” who then
lead migrations using
ultralight aircraft
 Crane video

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Spatial Learning and Cognitive Maps
 Spatial learning is the establishment of a memory
that reflects the environment’s spatial structure
 Niko Tinbergen showed how digger wasps use
landmarks to find nest entrances

Result

Experiment

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Spatial Learning and Cognitive Maps,
Continued
 A cognitive map is an internal representation of
spatial relationships between objects in an animal’s
surroundings
 For example, Clark’s nutcrackers can find food hidden
in caches located halfway between particular
landmarks

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Associative Learning

 In associative learning, animals associate one

feature of their environment with another
 For example, a blue jay will avoid eating monarchs
and similar-looking butterflies after an experience with
a distasteful monarch butterfly
 Classical conditioning is a type of associative
learning in which an arbitrary stimulus is associated
with a reward or punishment
 For example, a dog that repeatedly hears a bell
before being fed will salivate in response to the sound
of a bell in anticipation of a meal
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Associative Learning, Continued

 Operant conditioning is a type of associative

learning in which an animal learns to associate one
of its behaviors with a reward or punishment
 It is also called trial-and-error learning
 For example, a rat that is fed after pushing a lever will
learn to push the lever in order to receive food

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Cognition and Problem Solving

 Cognition is a process of knowing that involves

awareness, reasoning, recollection, and judgment
 It was once thought that only primates and certain
marine mammals exhibit cognition, but other groups
including insects use abstract thinking
 For example, honeybees can distinguish “same” from
“different” and distinguish between human faces

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Cognition and Problem Solving, Continued

 Problem solving is a cognitive activity of devising a

strategy to overcome an obstacle
 Problem solving is highly developed in some
mammals
 For example, chimpanzees can stack boxes in order
to reach suspended food
 Some bird species, particularly corvids, demonstrate
complex problem solving
 For example, ravens can obtain food suspended by a
string by pulling up the string

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Social Learning

 Social learning is learning through the observation

of others
 For example, young chimpanzees learn to crack palm
nuts with stones by copying experienced
chimpanzees
 For example, young vervet monkeys learn from older
monkeys to give and respond to distinct alarm calls
for different predators

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Social Learning, Continued

 Culture is a system of information transfer through

observation or teaching that influences behavior of
individuals in a population
 Culture can alter behavior and influence the fitness
of individuals

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Concept 51.3: Selection for individual survival
and reproductive success can explain diverse
behaviors
 Behavior enhances survival and reproductive
success in a population
 Natural selection refines behaviors that enhance the
efficiency of feeding
 Foraging, or food-obtaining behavior, includes
recognizing, searching for, capturing, and eating
food items

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Optimal Foraging Model

 The optimal foraging model views foraging

behavior as a compromise between benefits of
nutrition and costs of obtaining food
 The costs of obtaining food include energy
expenditure and the risk of being eaten while
foraging
 Natural selection should favor foraging behavior that
minimizes the costs and maximizes the benefits
 Crow video

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Balancing Risk and Reward

 Risk of predation affects foraging behavior

 For example, despite uniform availability of food
across habitat types, mule deer feed predominantly in
open areas
 Mountain lions kill more mule deer at forest edges
than in open areas

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Altruism

 Natural selection favors behavior that maximizes an

individual’s survival and reproduction
 These behaviors are often selfish
 On occasion, some animals behave in ways that
reduce their individual fitness but increase the
fitness of others
 This kind of behavior is called altruism
 Meer cats

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Altruism: Continued

 For example, under threat from a predator, an

individual Belding’s ground squirrel will make an
alarm call to warn others, even though calling
increases the chances that the caller is killed
 For example, in naked mole rat populations,
nonreproductive individuals may sacrifice their lives
protecting their reproductive queen and kings from
predators

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