Urbanization and individual differences in exploration and plasticity. (10th August 2018)
- Record Type:
- Journal Article
- Title:
- Urbanization and individual differences in exploration and plasticity. (10th August 2018)
- Main Title:
- Urbanization and individual differences in exploration and plasticity
- Authors:
- Thompson, Megan Joy
Evans, Julian Claude
Parsons, Sheena
Morand-Ferron, Julie - Abstract:
- Abstract : We show that urban chickadees are faster explorers than forest chickadees. Fast explorers are expected to colonize urban areas more readily but, as of yet, their information gathering strategies have not been examined. We find that exploration behaviors of urban individuals are more repeatable, suggesting that urban individuals benefit from diverging more from one another in their behaviour. Abstract: Urban environments impose novel challenges on animals and, as a result, the behaviors of urban wildlife are changing. In particular, high exploratory tendencies and an ability to gather more information from the environment may facilitate adoption of novel ecological opportunities. As of yet, very few studies have examined if urbanization predicts the way in which animals explore novel environments, or the extent of among-individual variation within these habitats. Here, we assess exploration and its temporal plasticity in black-capped chickadees ( Poecile atricapillus ; N = 169 individuals, 14 sites) caught along an urban gradient to examine individual differences in exploration and changes in exploration over time and assays under a reaction-norm framework. As predicted, urban birds were significantly faster explorers in a novel environment (contacted more features and moved more), however urbanization did not predict individual differences in the change in exploration over time. Exploration score was moderately repeatable; interestingly, urban chickadees were moreAbstract : We show that urban chickadees are faster explorers than forest chickadees. Fast explorers are expected to colonize urban areas more readily but, as of yet, their information gathering strategies have not been examined. We find that exploration behaviors of urban individuals are more repeatable, suggesting that urban individuals benefit from diverging more from one another in their behaviour. Abstract: Urban environments impose novel challenges on animals and, as a result, the behaviors of urban wildlife are changing. In particular, high exploratory tendencies and an ability to gather more information from the environment may facilitate adoption of novel ecological opportunities. As of yet, very few studies have examined if urbanization predicts the way in which animals explore novel environments, or the extent of among-individual variation within these habitats. Here, we assess exploration and its temporal plasticity in black-capped chickadees ( Poecile atricapillus ; N = 169 individuals, 14 sites) caught along an urban gradient to examine individual differences in exploration and changes in exploration over time and assays under a reaction-norm framework. As predicted, urban birds were significantly faster explorers in a novel environment (contacted more features and moved more), however urbanization did not predict individual differences in the change in exploration over time. Exploration score was moderately repeatable; interestingly, urban chickadees were more repeatable in their initial exploration behaviors, but seemed less repeatable in how they explored over time between assays in comparison to forest birds. Our results support the importance of high exploratory tendencies for urban animals, and suggest, for the first time, that individuals from urban and non-urban habitats differ in the amount of among-individual variation in exploration, and thus urban individuals may benefit from diverging more from one another in their behavior. Future work should examine the extent to which this variation in exploration and plasticity of exploration behaviors represent differences in how individuals gather information from their environment. … (more)
- Is Part Of:
- Behavioral ecology. Volume 29:Number 6(2018)
- Journal:
- Behavioral ecology
- Issue:
- Volume 29:Number 6(2018)
- Issue Display:
- Volume 29, Issue 6 (2018)
- Year:
- 2018
- Volume:
- 29
- Issue:
- 6
- Issue Sort Value:
- 2018-0029-0006-0000
- Page Start:
- 1415
- Page End:
- 1425
- Publication Date:
- 2018-08-10
- Subjects:
- behavioral plasticity -- HIREC -- multilevel mixed model -- personality -- urban wildlife -- reaction-norm repeatability
Animal behavior -- Periodicals
Behavior evolution -- Periodicals
Ecology -- Periodicals
Psychology, Comparative -- Periodicals
591.5 - Journal URLs:
- http://beheco.oupjournals.org ↗
http://beheco.oxfordjournals.org ↗
http://ukcatalogue.oup.com/ ↗
http://firstsearch.oclc.org ↗ - DOI:
- 10.1093/beheco/ary103 ↗
- Languages:
- English
- ISSNs:
- 1045-2249
- Deposit Type:
- Legaldeposit
- View Content:
- Available online (eLD content is only available in our Reading Rooms) ↗
- Physical Locations:
- British Library DSC - 1877.390000
British Library DSC - BLDSS-3PM
British Library HMNTS - ELD Digital store - Ingest File:
- 12207.xml