Ethology - High Yield Terms
1. Aestivation and Hibernation. Aestivation is also summer sleep, is a rare state of dormancy similar to
hibernation. It is adaptation to tackle hyperthermic conditions. The decreased amount of water in the
environment induces hyperthermic conditions. Many animals such Amoeba, mollusks and even fishes make
cysts, cocoons etc. for protecting their body from high temperature. These devices enable the astivators to
avoid tissue dehydration, loss of enzymes and turn of mechanism of metabolism. The dormancy during the
winter season is called Hibernation or winter sleep. Both hibernation and aestivation involve a state of
torpor in which the rate of metabolism is greatly lowered and body temperature reduced.
2.
Homing instinct. Homing instinct is the phenomenon of birds and animals returning to their home after
being displaced to far off places for various reasons. Pigeons, when released at points great distances away,
often hundreds of miles or more can fly home without failure.
3. Territoriality. Territoriality is a term associated with nonverbal communication that refers to how people
use space to communicate ownership occupancy of areas and possessions. The anthropological concept
branches from the observations of animal ownership behaviors. We can consider that this personal space is
like a bubble that one doesn't want invaded.
4.
Latent learning. The latent learning or hidden learning is a type of learning which involves an animals using
experience gained at one time in the modification of behavior at a much later time. The latent learning is
advantageous to the animal in future when a situation arise.
5.
Photo period. Recurring daily cycles of light and darkness have been known to exert a profound influence
on the behavior of most organisms. These behavioural rhythms have relation to the movement of the earth
relative to the sum and moon. The earth’s rotation on its own axis creates alternating day and night
changes. Daily cycle inclusive of a period of illumination followed by a period of darkness is called the
photoperiod. The terms photophase and scotophase denote the period of light and the period of darkness
respectively. Organisms have evolved different morphological and physiological and behavioural
adaptations during the course of evolution to cope with the varying photoperiod.
6. Motivation.A goal oriented behavior is called motivation. A specific motivational state leads an animal to
organize its behavior towards specific goal. When studying different motivational state we can quite often
observe three stages in an animal’s behavior, like searching phase ( a phase of searching for the goal),
orientation phase ( oriented around the goal once it is found) and quiescence phase ( a phase of quiescence
following the achievement of the goal).
7. Learning. There are two modes of behavior – innate and learned. Innate behavior is instinctive, built-in, and
inherited whereas learned behavior is the behavior acquired and modifiable by experience. Different types
of learning exhibited by animals are habituation, conditioned reflex, trial and error learning, latent learning,
insight learning and imprinting.
8.
Habituation. Habituation is the simplest type of learning. Habituation involves not the acquisition of new
responses but the loss of old ones. Habituation is the learning by an animal not to respond to stimulus. This
has great adaptive significance. Every time when the animal responds to a stimulus it is expending energy.
9. Social organization in mammals. The term social organization refers to populations and not to individuals
and defines the nature of the interactions between members of a species. In mammals it is a much more
dynamic phenomenon, and may vary with changing conditions. The social organization of mammals is
described under the headings –dominance hierarchy, territorial behavior, and mating groups and mating
strategies.
10. Diapause. Diapause is the spontaneous arrest of insect development in the life cycle of insects, which may
occur at any stage of development. It is specific physiological condition marked by reduction of metabolic
activity. Numerous species of insects interrupt the development of the young stages in summer and enter
diapause. This period of suspended development may be an apparent response to the approach of adverse
environmental factors.