Department of Biology and Ecology of Fishes, Leibniz-Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries, , Müggelseedamm 310, Berlin 12587, Germany, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Pittsburgh, , Pittsburgh, PA 15260, USA.
Proc Biol Sci. 2014 Mar 26;281(1783):20133166. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2013.3166. Print 2014 May 22.
While there are now a number of theoretical models predicting how consistent individual differences in behaviour may be generated and maintained, so far, there are few empirical tests. The social niche specialization hypothesis predicts that repeated social interactions among individuals may generate among-individual differences and reinforce within-individual consistency through positive feedback mechanisms. Here, we test this hypothesis using groups of the social spider Stegodyphus mimosarum that differ in their level of familiarity. In support of the social niche specialization hypothesis, individuals in groups of spiders that were more familiar with each other showed greater repeatable among-individual variation in behaviour. Additionally, individuals that were more familiar with each other exhibited lower within-individual variation in behaviour, providing one of the first examples of how the social environment can influence behavioural consistency. Our study demonstrates the potential for the social environment to generate and reinforce consistent individual differences in behaviour and provides a potentially general mechanism to explain this type of behavioural variation in animals with stable social groups.
虽然现在有许多理论模型可以预测行为的个体差异是如何产生和维持的，但到目前为止，实证检验还很少。社会小生境特化假说预测，个体之间的反复社会互动可能通过正反馈机制产生个体间差异，并增强个体内一致性。在这里，我们使用熟悉程度不同的社会性蜘蛛 Stegodyphus mimosarum 群体来检验这一假说。支持社会小生境特化假说，在彼此更熟悉的蜘蛛群体中，个体表现出更大的行为个体间可重复性差异。此外，彼此更熟悉的个体表现出较低的个体内行为变化，这是社会环境如何影响行为一致性的首例实例之一。我们的研究表明，社会环境有可能产生和加强行为的个体差异的一致性，并为具有稳定社会群体的动物的这种行为变异提供了一种潜在的一般机制。
