Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

Optimal Foraging

Optimal Foraging

How animals obtain and eat their food is called foraging behavior. Foraging can include searching for plants and hunting for prey and depends on the species and environment.

Predator-Prey Interactions

Predator-Prey Interactions

Predators consume prey for energy. Predators that acquire prey and prey that avoid predation both increase their chances of survival and reproduction (i.e., fitness). Routine predator-prey interactions elicit mutual adaptations that improve predator offenses, such as claws, teeth, and speed, as well as prey defenses, including crypsis, aposematism, and mimicry. Thus, predator-prey interactions resemble an evolutionary arms race.

What is Behavior?

What is Behavior?

Behaviors are actions that an organism engages in—they can be related to finding food, reproducing, defending against threats, and many other possible actions. Behaviors include activities related to the environment around the animal—such as migration—as well as social interactions within a species or population. Many behaviors involve motor output—that is, muscle movements—while others involve less visible actions, such as learning.

Instinctive Drift

Instinctive Drift

Instinctive drift refers to the tendency of animals to revert to their innate behaviors despite repeated reinforcement. Breland and Breland demonstrated this concept in an experiment with a raccoon. The raccoon was trained to pick up two coins and place them in a container in exchange for food. Initially, the raccoon learned to associate the coins with food, making them a conditioned stimulus or a substitute for food. However, over time, the raccoon became less willing to put the coins into the...

Evolutionary Psychology

Evolutionary Psychology

Evolutionary psychology explores the origins of human behavior and mental processes by framing them within the context of natural selection, a theory famously propounded by Charles Darwin. This field asserts that many behaviors common across human societies — ranging from instinctive fear reactions to complex social interactions — arose as evolutionary adaptations. These adaptations enhanced the survival and reproductive success of our ancestors, thereby becoming embedded in the...

Frequency-dependent Selection

Frequency-dependent Selection

When the fitness of a trait is influenced by how common it is (i.e., its frequency) relative to different traits within a population, this is referred to as frequency-dependent selection. Frequency-dependent selection may occur between species or within a single species. This type of selection can either be positive—with more common phenotypes having higher fitness—or negative, with rarer phenotypes conferring increased fitness.

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

Establishment and validation of a dual-analyte high-performance liquid chromatography method for detecting thimerosal and phenol in veterinary vaccines.

Scientific reports·2026

Same author

Heterogeneous suppressive effect of Wolbachia incompatible insect technique coupled with sterile insect technique across time and historical Ae. aegypti abundance - using distributional synthetic controls.

PLoS computational biology·2026

Same author

Effects of online collaborative learning and simulation-based learning on pedagogical knowledge and teaching efficacy in digital education.

Scientific reports·2026

Same author

Transition From Land to Sea: Comparative Genomics Illuminates the Adaptive Evolution of the Intertidal Spider.

Molecular ecology resources·2026

Same author

Exercise Motivation and Quality of Life in Cancer Survivors: The Impact of Exercise Intervention.

Cancers·2026

Same author

Investigating the analytical robustness of the social and behavioural sciences.

Nature·2026

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: Mar 8, 2026

A Real-Time Interactive System for Studying Confrontational Pursuit Behavior in Rodents

A Real-Time Interactive System for Studying Confrontational Pursuit Behavior in Rodents

Published on: May 16, 2025

Predator personality and prey behavioural predictability jointly determine foraging performance.

Chia-Chen Chang¹, Huey Yee Teo¹, Y Norma-Rashid²

¹Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Singapore, 14 Science Drive 4, 117543, Singapore.

Scientific Reports

|January 18, 2017

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Predator and prey personality traits and their behavioral variability jointly impact hunting success. Aggressive predators excel with unpredictable prey, while docile predators perform better with predictable prey.

More Related Videos

A Fish-feeding Laboratory Bioassay to Assess the Antipredatory Activity of Secondary Metabolites from the Tissues of Marine Organisms

A Fish-feeding Laboratory Bioassay to Assess the Antipredatory Activity of Secondary Metabolites from the Tissues of Marine Organisms

Published on: January 11, 2015

Assaying Predatory Feeding Behaviors in Pristionchus and Other Nematodes

Assaying Predatory Feeding Behaviors in Pristionchus and Other Nematodes

Published on: September 4, 2016

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: Mar 8, 2026

A Real-Time Interactive System for Studying Confrontational Pursuit Behavior in Rodents

A Real-Time Interactive System for Studying Confrontational Pursuit Behavior in Rodents

Published on: May 16, 2025

A Fish-feeding Laboratory Bioassay to Assess the Antipredatory Activity of Secondary Metabolites from the Tissues of Marine Organisms

A Fish-feeding Laboratory Bioassay to Assess the Antipredatory Activity of Secondary Metabolites from the Tissues of Marine Organisms

Published on: January 11, 2015

Assaying Predatory Feeding Behaviors in Pristionchus and Other Nematodes

Assaying Predatory Feeding Behaviors in Pristionchus and Other Nematodes

Published on: September 4, 2016

Area of Science:

Behavioral Ecology
Animal Behavior
Predator-Prey Dynamics

Background:

Predator-prey interactions are fundamental to ecological communities.
Individual differences in behavior (personality) and behavioral variability (intra-individual variability, IIV) influence these interactions.
The combined effects of predator and prey personality and IIV on foraging performance are not well understood.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate how personality type and IIV of both predators and prey jointly affect predator foraging performance.
To empirically test the combined influence of predator and prey behavioral traits on interaction outcomes.

Main Methods:

Utilized a predator-prey system: Portia labiata (predator) and Cosmophasis umbratica (prey).
Assessed personality types and IIVs for both predator and prey species.
Quantified predator foraging performance based on prey capture attempts.

Main Results:

A significant joint effect of personality type and predictability (IIV) on predator foraging performance was observed.
Aggressive predators were more successful with unpredictable (high IIV) prey.
Docile predators performed better with predictable (low IIV) prey.

Conclusions:

Both predator and prey personality types and their intra-individual variability are crucial in shaping predator-prey interactions.
Understanding the interplay of these behavioral traits provides deeper insights into ecological dynamics.