Fractal analysis of behaviour in a wild primate: behavioural complexity in health and disease

MacIntosh, Andrew J. J.; Alados, Concepción L.; Huffman, Michael A.

doi:10.1098/rsif.2011.0049

Cited by 66 publications

(85 citation statements)

References 51 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Reductions in the complexity of behavioural patterns have been associated with stressful conditions in a number of studies, and have also been used as a non-invasive indicator of health impairment [63,64]. In primates, fractal analysis has been used to show that health impairment by intestinal parasites results in increased periodicity of [65,66]. Complex or unpredictable behaviour is believed to be advantageous, because it allows organisms to adapt to changing environments [44,66].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In primates, fractal analysis has been used to show that health impairment by intestinal parasites results in increased periodicity of [65,66]. Complex or unpredictable behaviour is believed to be advantageous, because it allows organisms to adapt to changing environments [44,66]. Thus, while beneficial in the short term for mitigating the costs of infection, prolonged expression of sickness behaviours could have fitness costs.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Sickness behaviour associated with non-lethal infections in wild primates

et al. 2015

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Non-lethal parasite infections are common in wildlife, but there is little information on their clinical consequences. Here, we pair infection data from a ubiquitous soil-transmitted helminth, the whipworm (genus Trichuris), with activity data from a habituated group of wild red colobus monkeys (Procolobus rufomitratus tephrosceles) in Kibale National Park, Uganda. We use mixed-effect models to examine the relationship between non-lethal parasitism and red colobus behaviour. Our results indicate that red colobus increased resting and decreased more energetically costly behaviours when shedding whipworm eggs in faeces. Temporal patterns of behaviour also changed, with individuals switching behaviour less frequently when whipworm-positive. Feeding frequency did not differ, but red colobus consumption of bark and two plant species from the genus Albizia, which are used locally in traditional medicines, significantly increased when animals were shedding whipworm eggs. These results suggest self-medicative plant use, although additional work is needed to verify this conclusion. Our results indicate sickness behaviours, which are considered an adaptive response by hosts during infection. Induction of sickness behaviour in turn suggests that these primates are clinically sensitive to non-lethal parasite infections.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sickness behaviour associated with non-lethal infections in wild primates

et al. 2015

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Additionally, those who responded to social reorganization with larger increases in cortisol were at greater risk for infection (Cohen et al, 1997). example, great apes and humans share a propensity to cardiomyopathy (Hansen, Alford, & Keeling, 1984) and heart failure, the leading cause of death in great apes (Videan et al, 2009 (Pryce, Dettling, Spengler, Schnell, & Feldon, 2004), mentioned in the introduction of reports (F€ urtbauer, Heistermann, Sch € Ulke, & Ostner, 2014;Hämäläinen, Heistermann, & Kraus, 2015;Hoffman et al, 2011;Laudenslager, Jorgensen, & Fairbanks, 2012;MacIntosh, Alados, & Huffman, 2011;MacLarnon et al, 2015;Schoof, Jack, & Ziegler, 2014), and/or used to frame results in discussions (Coplan et al, 2015;Barr, Newman, Lindell, et al, 2004;F€ urtbauer et al, 2014;Hoffman et al, 2011;MacIntosh et al, 2011;Mendonça-Furtado et al, 2014;Onyango, Gesquiere, Wango, Alberts, & Altmann, 2008 ( variety of publications. One group assigned allostatic load levels to various animal species based on dominance rank without calculating an ALI (Goymann & Wingfield, 2004 ACTH, adrenocorticotropin-releasing hormone; BMI, body mass index; CRF, corticotropin-releasing factor; DBP, diastolic blood pressure; DHEA-S, dehydroepiandrosterone-sulfate; HDL, high-density lipoprotein; IGF-1, insulin-like growth factor 1; IL-1ra, interleukin-1 receptor antagonist; IL-6, interleukin-6; IL-8, interleukin-8; LDL, low-density lipoprotein; LH, luteinizing hormone; SBP, systolic blood pressure; WBC, white blood cells.…”

Section: Allostatic Load During Growth a N D De V E L O P Me N Tmentioning

confidence: 99%

Allostatic load and biological anthropology

Edes

Crews

2017

American J Phys Anthropol

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Multiple stressors affect developing and adult organisms, thereby partly structuring their phenotypes. Determining how stressors influence health, well-being, and longevity in human and nonhuman primate populations are major foci within biological anthropology. Although much effort has been devoted to examining responses to multiple environmental and sociocultural stressors, no holistic metric to measure stress-related physiological dysfunction has been widely applied within biological anthropology. Researchers from disciplines outside anthropology are using allostatic load indices (ALIs) to estimate such dysregulation and examine life-long outcomes of stressor exposures, including morbidity and mortality. Following allostasis theory, allostatic load represents accumulated physiological and somatic damage secondary to stressors and senescent processes experienced over the lifespan. ALIs estimate this wear-and-tear using a composite of biomarkers representing neuroendocrine, cardiovascular, metabolic, and immune systems. Across samples, ALIs are associated significantly with multiple individual characteristics (e.g., age, sex, education, DNA variation) of interest within biological anthropology. They also predict future outcomes, including aspects of life history variation (e.g., survival, lifespan), mental and physical health, morbidity and mortality, and likely health disparities between groups, by stressor exposures, ethnicity, occupations, and degree of departure from local indigenous life ways and integration into external and commodified ones. ALIs also may be applied to similar stress-related research areas among nonhuman primates. Given the reports from multiple research endeavors, here we propose ALIs may be useful for assessing stressors, stress responses, and stress-related dysfunction, current and long-term cognitive function, health and well-being, and risk of early mortality across many research programs within biological anthropology. K E Y W O R D Saging, allostasis, frailty, growth and development, nonhuman primates, senescence, stress | I N T R O D U C T I O NTraditional research foci within biological anthropology include variations in stress, morbidity, and mortality (for reviews, see Ice & James, 2007;Little, 2010). Despite this long-term focus, the field continues to pursue a reliable, relatively easy to apply metric for assessing lifetime stress and stress-related outcomes. We suggest incorporating the theory of allostasis and methods for assessing allostatic load within anthropological theory and methodology to aid in closing this gap. As a theory, allostasis was developed to explain how mammalian physiological responses to stressors in their environments evolved to maximize the probability of survival while limiting somatic damage (Korte, Koolhaas, Wingfield, & McEwen, 2005;McEwen & Stellar, 1993;McEwen & Wingfield, 2003;Sterling, 2004Sterling, , 2012Sterling & Eyer, 1988). Unfortunately, such beneficial defensive responses come at a cost and, over time, repeated allostatic activi...

show abstract

“…* Normality of circadian ethogram and expression of behavioural complexity (MacIntosh et al 2011). * Feed intake.…”

Section: Defining the Phenotypementioning

confidence: 99%

Resilience in farm animals: biology, management, breeding and implications for animal welfare

2016

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Abstract.A capacity for the animal to recover quickly from the impact of physical and social stressors and disease challenges is likely to improve evolutionary fitness of wild species and welfare and performance of farm animals. Salience and valence of stimuli sensed through neurosensors, chemosensors and immunosensors are perceived and integrated centrally to generate emotions and engage physiological, behavioural, immune, cognitive and morphological responses that defend against noxious challenges. These responses can be refined through experience to provide anticipatory and learned reactions at lower cost than innate less-specific reactions. Influences of behaviour type, coping style, and affective state and the relationships between immune responsiveness, disease resistance and resilience are reviewed. We define resilience as the capacity of animals to cope with short-term perturbations in their environment and return rapidly to their pre-challenge status. It is manifested in response to episodic, sporadic or situation-specific attributes of the environment and can be optimised via facultative learning by the individual. It is a comparative measure of differences between individuals in the outcomes that follow exposure to potentially adverse situations. In contrast, robustness is the capacity to maintain productivity in a wide range of environments without compromising reproduction, health and wellbeing. Robustness is manifested in response to persistent or cyclical attributes of the environment and is effected via activity of innate regulatory pathways. We suggest that for farm animals, husbandry practices that incorporate physical and social stressors and interactions with humans such as weaning, change of housing, and introduction to the milking parlour can be used to characterise resilience phenotypes. In these settings, resilience is likely to be more readily identified through the rate of return of variables to pre-challenge or normal status rather than through measuring the activity of diverse stress response and adaptation mechanisms. Our strategy for phenotyping resilience of sheep and cattle during weaning is described. Opportunities are examined to increase resilience through genetic selection and through improved management practices that provide emotional and cognitive enrichment and stress inoculation.Additional keywords: affective state, allostasis, animal behaviour, animal temperament, animal welfare, disease resistance, genetic selection, homeostasis, resilience, robustness, stress inoculation.

show abstract

Fractal analysis of behaviour in a wild primate: behavioural complexity in health and disease

Cited by 66 publications

References 51 publications

Sickness behaviour associated with non-lethal infections in wild primates

Sickness behaviour associated with non-lethal infections in wild primates

Allostatic load and biological anthropology

Resilience in farm animals: biology, management, breeding and implications for animal welfare

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About