Aigueperse Nadège, Houdelier Cécilia, Le Bot Océane, de Margerie Emmanuel, Lumineau Sophie
Université de Rennes, CNRS, Université de Caen Normandie, UMR 6552 laboratoire d'éthologie animale et humaine, Rennes, France.
CNRS, UMR 6552 Université de Rennes, Université de Caen Normandie, laboratoire d'éthologie animale et humaine, Rennes, France.
Behav Processes. 2020 Oct;179:104193. doi: 10.1016/j.beproc.2020.104193. Epub 2020 Jul 6.
Beyond the genetic links between mother and young, prenatal effects experienced by offspring can modulate their mother's behaviour and stress. Here we investigated the consequences of stress-induced prenatal maternal effects on quail chicks' behaviour and maternal behaviour. We evaluated how adoptive quail mothers (unstressed) raised chicks of females that had either been stressed (PS) or were non-stressed (NPS) during laying. We demonstrated previously that our social stress procedure during laying increases levels of egg yolk steroid and chicks' emotional reactivity during the postnatal period. We found that, compared to NPS mothers, PS mothers remained closer to their chicks, were aggressed and neglected them less, emitted more maternal vocalisations and called their chicks more when they were separated. Moreover, PS chicks made more requests on their mother. Our results show that mothers responded to chicks' behavioural changes caused by prenatal stress by adapting their maternal behaviour. As exemplified here, for the first time in birds, prenatal environment can affect postnatal maternal behaviour by changing their offspring's behaviour.
除了母亲与幼雏之间的遗传联系外，后代所经历的产前影响会调节其母亲的行为和应激反应。在此，我们研究了应激诱导的产前母体效应对鹌鹑雏鸟行为和母性行为的影响。我们评估了收养的鹌鹑母亲（未受应激）养育在产蛋期间受到应激（PS）或未受应激（NPS）的雌性所产的雏鸟的情况。我们之前证明，我们在产蛋期间的社会应激程序会增加蛋黄类固醇水平以及雏鸟在出生后时期的情绪反应性。我们发现，与NPS母亲相比，PS母亲与雏鸟靠得更近，受到的攻击更少，对雏鸟的忽视也更少，发出更多的母性叫声，并且在与雏鸟分开时呼唤它们的次数更多。此外，PS雏鸟向母亲提出的需求更多。我们的结果表明，母亲会通过调整其母性行为来应对产前应激引起的雏鸟行为变化。如此处所示，鸟类中首次证明，产前环境可通过改变后代行为来影响产后母性行为。
