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Lifetime stability of social traits in bottlenose dolphins.

ABSTRACT: Behavioral phenotypic traits or "animal personalities" drive critical evolutionary processes such as fitness, disease and information spread. Yet the stability of behavioral traits, essential by definition, has rarely been measured over developmentally significant periods of time, limiting our understanding of how behavioral stability interacts with ontogeny. Based on 32 years of social behavioral data for 179 wild bottlenose dolphins, we show that social traits (associate number, time alone and in large groups) are stable from infancy to late adulthood. Multivariate analysis revealed strong relationships between these stable metrics within individuals, suggesting a complex behavioral syndrome comparable to human extraversion. Maternal effects (particularly vertical social learning) and sex-specific reproductive strategies are likely proximate and ultimate drivers for these patterns. We provide rare empirical evidence to demonstrate the persistence of social behavioral traits over decades in a non-human animal.

SUBMITTER: Evans T

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8213821 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Lifetime stability of social traits in bottlenose dolphins.

Evans Taylor T Krzyszczyk Ewa E Frère Céline C Mann Janet J

Communications biology 20210618 1

Behavioral phenotypic traits or "animal personalities" drive critical evolutionary processes such as fitness, disease and information spread. Yet the stability of behavioral traits, essential by definition, has rarely been measured over developmentally significant periods of time, limiting our understanding of how behavioral stability interacts with ontogeny. Based on 32 years of social behavioral data for 179 wild bottlenose dolphins, we show that social traits (associate number, time alone and ...[more]

PMID: 34145380

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Project description:In recent decades, animal welfare science has evolved to utilize a multidisciplinary approach to assess the welfare of animals in accredited zoos and aquariums. Science-based animal welfare assessments have become an essential component of management programs and widespread application is expected by animal care professionals. Management practices for bottlenose dolphins in accredited facilities incorporate several programs that potentially impact animal welfare including environmental enrichment and animal training. Additionally, habitat characteristics, such as the dimensions of the habitat, have been proposed to affect welfare. While accredited facilities are required to meet high standards of care, habitat characteristics and management practices are not standardized across locations. Knowledge and subsequent application of these practices and habitat characteristics can enhance our understanding of factors associated with positive welfare. As part of a larger study of dolphin welfare titled "Towards understanding the welfare of cetaceans in zoos and aquariums" (colloquially called the Cetacean Welfare Study), survey data were collected from 86 bottlenose dolphins in 40 habitats at 38 facilities in seven countries. The major aims of this paper are to provide general descriptive information regarding dolphin management in accredited zoos and aquariums and to provide supplemental context to the other research published from the Cetacean Welfare Study data set. This paper provides a review of current habitat characteristics and management practices at those 38 accredited zoos and aquariums. These data enabled the identification and quantification of how cetacean management practices differed between participating facilities accredited by the Alliance for Marine Mammal Parks and Aquariums and the Association of Zoos & Aquariums. Variables were selected based on their potential association with welfare including the physical habitat, environmental enrichment, and training programs. The variables were also used for subsequent research in this collection of related papers to investigate important connections between potential indicators of welfare and habitat characteristics, environmental enrichment, and training programs.

Project description:Both natural and human-related foraging strategies by the common bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus) have resulted in social segregation in several areas of the world. Bottlenose dolphins near Savannah, Georgia beg at an unprecedented rate and also forage behind commercial shrimp trawlers, providing an opportunity to study the social ramifications of two human-related foraging behaviors within the same group of animals. Dolphins were photo-identified via surveys conducted throughout estuarine waterways around Savannah in the summers of 2009-2011. Mean half-weight indices (HWI) were calculated for each foraging class, and community division by modularity was used to cluster animals based on association indices. Pairs of trawler dolphins had a higher mean HWI (0.20 ± 0.07) than pairs of non-trawler dolphins (0.04 ± 0.02) or mixed pairs (0.02 ± 0.02). In contrast, pairs of beggars, non-beggars, and mixed pairs all had similar means, with HWI between 0.05-0.07. Community division by modularity produced a useful division (0.307) with 6 clusters. Clusters were predominately divided according to trawler status; however, beggars and non-beggars were mixed throughout clusters. Both the mean HWI and social clusters revealed that the social structure of common bottlenose dolphins near Savannah, Georgia was differentiated based on trawler status but not beg status. This finding may indicate that foraging in association with trawlers is a socially learned behavior, while the mechanisms for the propagation of begging are less clear. This study highlights the importance of taking into account the social parameters of a foraging behavior, such as how group size or competition for resources may affect how the behavior spreads. The positive or negative ramifications of homophily may influence whether the behaviors are exhibited by individuals within the same social clusters and should be considered in future studies examining social relationships and foraging behaviors.

Dataset Information

Lifetime stability of social traits in bottlenose dolphins.

Publications

Lifetime stability of social traits in bottlenose dolphins.

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