Daniel Danita K, Bhat Anuradha
Department of Biological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research - Kolkata, Mohanpur, India.
Front Psychol. 2022 Mar 4;13:786486. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.786486. eCollection 2022.
Animal personality refers to the consistency of variation in behavior among individuals which may be the driving force behind variations in complex behaviors as well. Individual personality could predict how well an organism would perform in behavior and cognition related tasks, as well as survive and thrive in its environment. Therefore, we would expect inter-individual variations in many behaviors, which would persist even if habituation to the experimental setup occurs, which generally results in convergence of behavior (i.e., the difference between individuals becomes less pronounced). Our study used wild-caught zebrafish () from three natural habitats with differing ecological regimes, to understand how consistency and repeatability in specific traits such as boldness, exploration, and spatial ability varies across and within populations even when habituation causes change in behavior. We found that the extent of individual variation differs between populations, with dynamic habitats showing similar repeatability. This indicates that habitat conditions are important drivers of individual variation in addition to other factors, such as sex or size of individuals within populations. Although we found that sex and size played an important role within some populations for some behaviors, in others, the variation was likely caused by other factors (for example, ecological factors such as vegetation and/or resource availability), for which we have not accounted. This study underlines the importance of studying inter-individual differences as the phenomenon that underpins multiple behavioral traits and explains the possible role of environmental and inherent factors that drive these differences.
动物个性指的是个体间行为变化的一致性，这也可能是复杂行为变化背后的驱动力。个体个性能够预测一个生物体在与行为和认知相关的任务中表现如何，以及在其环境中生存和繁衍的情况。因此，我们预计在许多行为中会存在个体间差异，即使对实验设置产生了习惯化，这种差异仍会持续存在，而习惯化通常会导致行为趋同（即个体之间的差异变得不那么明显）。我们的研究使用了从三种具有不同生态环境的自然栖息地捕获的野生斑马鱼，以了解即使习惯化导致行为发生变化，诸如胆量、探索和空间能力等特定性状在种群间和种群内的一致性和可重复性是如何变化的。我们发现种群之间个体差异的程度有所不同，动态栖息地表现出相似的可重复性。这表明，除了其他因素，如种群内个体的性别或大小之外，栖息地条件也是个体差异的重要驱动因素。尽管我们发现性别和大小在某些种群的某些行为中发挥了重要作用，但在其他种群中，这种差异可能是由其他因素（例如，植被和/或资源可用性等生态因素）导致的，而我们尚未考虑这些因素。这项研究强调了研究个体间差异的重要性，因为这一现象是多种行为特征的基础，并解释了驱动这些差异的环境和内在因素可能发挥的作用。
