Criteria for acceptable studies of animal personality and behavioural syndromes

Dingemanse, Niels Jeroen; Wright, Jonathan

doi:10.1111/eth.13082

Cited by 80 publications

(111 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…Existing studies, however, have several major shortfalls for our understanding of the association between Cepaea morphology and behavioral syndromes. In particular, individuals are generally assayed once, which means separating within‐ from among‐individual variation is impossible (Dingemanse & Wright, 2020; Niemelä & Dingemanse, 2018). This also means the level of total among‐individual variation, and how it compares with among‐morph variation, has remained to our knowledge unstudied.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Boldness and exploration vary between shell morphs but not environmental contexts in the snail Cepaea nemoralis

2021

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Understanding the maintenance of among‐individual behavioral variation in populations and predicting its consequences are key challenges in behavioral ecology. Studying the association between repeatable behaviors and other traits under selection may shed light on the underlying selective pressures. We used the model snail Cepaea nemoralis to examine whether individual behavior is associated with shell morph, a key trait that has been extensively studied in the context of thermal tolerance and predator avoidance, and which is known to be under strict genetic control in this species. We quantified proxies of boldness and exploration in snails of three morphs coming from two habitats with different thermal contexts. We show that both behaviors were repeatable at the among‐individual level (within‐state Rboldness = 0.22 [95% credible interval: 0.15; 0.29]; Rexploration = 0.20 [0.15; 0.25]). Behavior was associated with shell morph, with the darker morph (five‐banded) being consistently shyer and slower to explore. There was no evidence that thermal environment of origin influenced behavior. Snails became faster when test temperature increased; we found no evidence morphs differed in their thermal response. Boldness and exploration were correlated among individuals, forming a syndrome (r = 0.28 [0.10; 0.46]). The link we find between morph and boldness is compatible with visual selection by avian predators, assuming a positive association between boldness and morphological defense (phenotypic compensation hypothesis). The fact morph‐behaviors associations are consistent across environments, despite selection on morph, hint to a possible underlying genetic origin. Finally, we discuss how our findings combined with decades of evolutionary research make C. nemoralis a very valuable model to study the evolution of behavior in response to environmental changes.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Boldness and exploration vary between shell morphs but not environmental contexts in the snail Cepaea nemoralis

2021

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“…Individuals within single populations are often found to vary in their average behaviour across repeated observations, known as animal personality 1 , 2 . Traditionally, this among-individual behavioural variation was often attributed to random (i.e.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The serotonin transporter gene and female personality variation in a free-living passerine

Thys

Grunst

Staes

et al. 2021

Sci Rep

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Quantifying variation in behaviour-related genes provides insight into the evolutionary potential of repeatable among-individual variation in behaviour (i.e. personality). Yet, individuals typically also plastically adjust their behaviour in response to environmental conditions and/or age, thereby complicating the detection of genotype–phenotype associations. Here, using a population of free-living great tits (Parus major), we assessed the association between single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the serotonin transporter gene (SERT) and two repeatable behavioural traits, i.e. female-female aggression and female hissing behaviour. For female-female aggression, a trait showing age-related plasticity, we found no evidence for associations with SERT SNPs, even when assessing potential age-dependent effects of SERT genotype on aggression. We also found no strong support for associations between SERT SNPs and hissing behaviour, yet we identified two synonymous polymorphisms (exon 13 SNP66 and exon 12 SNP144) of particular interest, each explaining about 1.3% of the total variation in hissing behaviour. Overall, our results contribute to the general understanding of the biological underpinning of complex behavioural traits and will facilitate further (meta-analytic) research on behaviour-related genes. Moreover, we emphasize that future molecular genetic studies should consider age-dependent genotype–phenotype associations for behavioural trait (co)variation, as this will vastly improve our understanding of the proximate causes and ultimate consequences of personality variation in natural populations.

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“…Personality has been linked to likelihood of capture in a variety of species. Personality refers to the parts of an individual's behaviour that are repeatable (Dingemanse & Wright, 2020). In a classic study, Wilson et al.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Passive traps and sampling bias: Social effects and personality affect trap entry by sticklebacks

et al. 2021

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Researchers routinely quantify the behaviour of subsets of animals, using their findings to make inferences about wider populations. Broader conclusions, however, may be inaccurate if the subjects that are tested are not representative of these populations. One way that this can arise is through sampling bias, which can occur if the method of collecting the test subjects disproportionately selects those with particular attributes, such that they end up being over‐ or under represented within the sample. Passive traps are associated with such sampling biases and have been shown to target certain behavioural phenotypes in a range of species. Here we asked whether funnel‐type fish traps were more likely to target more active and more social sticklebacks (Gasterosteus aculeatus). We found that more subjects entered the traps when they already contained conspecifics and that individual measures of activity predicted trap entry, with more active fish being captured sooner both when the traps already contained conspecifics and when they were empty. Unexpectedly, less‐social fish were captured sooner when the traps contained conspecifics. Sampling biases have the potential to skew the data collected by researchers and we therefore highlight the need to acknowledge and discuss potential for sampling biases and any consequences that may arise from this in published work. In the longer term, research that estimates the potential for sampling biases for various collection methods and species would be a valuable resource for helping to devise more representative sampling designs.

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Criteria for acceptable studies of animal personality and behavioural syndromes

Cited by 80 publications

References 53 publications

Boldness and exploration vary between shell morphs but not environmental contexts in the snail Cepaea nemoralis

Boldness and exploration vary between shell morphs but not environmental contexts in the snail Cepaea nemoralis

The serotonin transporter gene and female personality variation in a free-living passerine

Passive traps and sampling bias: Social effects and personality affect trap entry by sticklebacks

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