E3.1 Distinguish between innate and learned behavior
Innate behavior is behavior which normally occurs in all
members of a species despite natural variation in environmental
influences
Some texts refer to innate behavior as species-specific behavior
Example: most migration in birds
Learned behavior develops as the result of experience; involves
the CNS which is more difficult to investigate
E.3.2 Design experiments to investigate innate behavior in
invertebrates, including either a taxis or a kinesis.
E.3.3 Analyze data from invertebrate behavior experiments
in terms of the effect on chances of survival and reproduction
• Animals must orient themselves by tracking stimuli in
their environment in order to travel, feed, and move from one
place to another
• The movement toward (positive) or away (negative) from
a stimulus is called taxis
• Not all responses, however, involve a specific
orientation with some animals becoming more or less active
with increases in stimulus
• These responses are called kineses; more random and
depend on intensity and not direction of the stimulus
• Innate behavior patterns develop independently of the
environmental context (subject to debate)*.
• They are controlled by genes and are inherited from
parents.
• They develop by natural selection, because they make
members of a species better adapted to their environment
and increase their chances of survival and reproduction.
• taxes and kineses are behavior patterns that increase
the survival chances of many invertebrates.
*Campbell, pg. 1054, Raven, pg. 1108
Some examples include:
Taxes
• Flatworms move towards food (positive chemotaxis)
• Euglena move towards light (positive phototaxis)
• Housefly larvae are negatively phototaxic after eating
ensuring that they remain in an area where they are harder to
detect from predators
Earthworms are also negatively phototaxic to protect
themselves from dessication.
Kineses
• Sowbugs or woodlice become more active in dry
areas and less active in humid ones which tends to keep
them in moist environments (more favorable)
E. 3.4 Discuss how the process of learning can
improve the chance of survival
• There are many situations where survival chances
can be increased as the result of learning
• In the process of learning, an animal will change
its behavior according to changing circumstances
• An animal may learn to recognize that the
warning call or behavior from individuals of another
species is to be followed by the appearance of a
predator
Birds learn to avoid the evil-tasting black and orange
caterpillars of the cinnabar moth by conditioning.
• Grizzly bears learn by operant conditioning how to
catch salmon.
• Goslings learn who their mother is by imprinting and
so avoid predators by remaining close to her.
E.3.5 Outline Pavlov’s experiments into
conditioning of dogs
• Ivan Pavlov investigated the salivation reflex in
dogs.
• He observed that dogs secreted saliva when they
saw or tasted food. The sight or taste of meat is called
the unconditioned stimulus
• The secretion of saliva is called the unconditioned
response.
• Pavlov then gave the dogs a neutral stimulus, such as
the sound of ringing bell or ticking metronome, before he
gave the unconditioned stimulus - the sight or taste of food.
• He found that, after repeating this procedure for a
few days, the dogs started to secrete saliva before they have
received the unconditioned stimulus.
• The sound of the bell or the metronome is called the
conditioned stimulus and the secretion of saliva before the
unconditioned stimulus is the conditioned response.
• The dogs had learned to associate two external
stimuli - the sound of a bell or metronome and the arrival of
food. This is called classical conditioning
E.3.6 Outline the role of inheritance and learning in
the development of birdsong in young birds.
• Birds have a genetic template, or instinctive
program, that guides them to learn the appropriate song.
• During a critical period of development, the
template will accept the correct song as a model
• Thus, song acquisition depends on learning, but
only the song of the correct species can be learned
• The genetic template for learning is selective
• In the white-crowned sparrow’s song there are 2
learning processes
• First, the bird must acquire a song type by hearing an
adult, and then it must learn to match this song by listening
to itself
• White-crowned sparrows raised in isolation in
soundproof chambers developed abnormal songs that had
only a slight resemblance to the normal adult song
• The crude, undeveloped song is the template
upon which the full song is developed and is acquired
through hearing an adult during the critical period of
development
• If the sparrows were exposed to taped songs of other
species, they did not develop that song indicating that
innate, or developmentally fixed, influences are present.
• Additional experiments have shown that birds more
than 50 days old that are living with other bird species will
learn the song of that species because social interaction is a
stronger stimulus than exposure to taped songs.
• Cuckoos, however, lay their eggs in the nests of other
bird species and have no opportunity to learn the cuckoo
song.
• The cuckoo song they later sing is innate since they
do not sing the song of the bird species they nest with.