Animal Behavior
Ethology
 Ethology is the scientific study of animal behavior
under natural conditions.
 It focuses on both instinctual and learned behaviors.
Behavior is essential
 Behavior is an essential
part of acquiring
nutrients for digestion
and of finding a mate for
reproduction.
 Behavior also
contributes to
homeostasis, as when
honeybees huddle
together to produce and
conserve heat.
Innate Behaviors (Instinctual)
 Behaviors determined by the “hard-wiring”
(genetics) of the nervous system.
 It is developmentally fixed throughout life.
 A given stimulus will trigger a given response.
 These behaviors are usually inborn and inflexible
and usually adapt the organism to its environment.
Bats use echolocation—emitting
high frequency sounds to locate
their prey.
Examples of Innate Behaviors:
Frogs
produce
sounds to
attract mates
Babies have a sucking
instinct from the moment
of birth.
Baby turtles swim
for the sea as soon
as they hatch.
Learned Behaviors
 Behavior that is
more or less
permanently altered
as a result of the
experience of the
individual organism.
Examples of Learned Behaviors:
Spatial Learning-A female
digger wasp will always
return exactly to her hidden
nest, even months later.
Classical Conditioning—
first described by Ivan
Pavlov who taught his dogs
to salivate at the sound of a
bell, anticipating their food.
Imprinting
 A type of behavior that includes both learned and
innate components. It is the formation at a specific
stage in life of a long-lasting behavioral response to
a particular individual or object.
Examples of Imprinting
 Konrad Lorenz showed that
the principal imprinting
stimulus in graylag geese is a
nearby object that is moving
away from the young.
 When incubator-hatched
goslings spent their first few
hours with Lorenz rather than
a goose, they imprinted on
him . They showed no
recognition of their biological
mother or other adults of their
species.
Orientation
 Behaviors in which animals position themselves with
respect to spatial features of their environment.
 Environmental cues trigger certain responses.
Examples of Orientation
Emperor Penguins huddle together in
the winter away from cold winds.
Llamas face the
same direction
as a flock
Crocodiles bask in
the sun to warm up.
Kinesis
 A change in activity rate in response to a stimulus.
 Kinesis movements are random turning or
movement of an animal in relation to a stimulus.
 An animal may change its speed or may tend to settle
down and stop moving depending on the stimulus.
Examples of Kinesis
Animals will appear to
move randomly in all
directions in a search
for food and then settle
down in one location
for a period of time.
Taxis
 Taxis is an oriented movement toward (positive
taxis) or away from (negative taxis) some stimulus.
Pink Salmon
swim
upstream to
spawn.
Example of Taxis:
Beetles in the Namib Desert in
Africa climb to the tops of sand
dunes to collect droplets of water
from the fog. They tilt their bodies
upwards so the water will run down
into their mouths.
Pheromones are hormones produced
by plants and animals that are
attractive to others of the same
species.