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Neuroplasticity reflects the brain's remarkable capacity to adapt and evolve, responding dynamically to learning, experiences, or injury by reorganizing its neural circuitry. This reorganization involves creating new neural connections and refining old ones through a series of biological processes that contribute to the brain's lifelong development and adaptability.
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Evolutionary Psychology01:20

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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...
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A Proboscis Extension Response Protocol for Investigating Behavioral Plasticity in Insects: Application to Basic, Biomedical, and Agricultural Research
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Behavioral plasticity can facilitate evolution in urban environments.

Tal Caspi1, Jacob R Johnson2, Max R Lambert3

  • 1Department of Environmental Science and Policy, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA, USA.

Trends in Ecology & Evolution
|September 4, 2022
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Behavioral plasticity in urban animals drives evolution. Cities provide unique opportunities to study how plastic behaviors, like altered habitat use, influence evolutionary changes through various mechanisms.

Keywords:
animal personalitybehavioral driveevolutionary divergenceplasticity-led evolutionurbanization

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Area of Science:

  • Evolutionary biology
  • Urban ecology
  • Animal behavior

Background:

  • Plasticity-led evolution is a key concept in evolutionary theory.
  • Studying plasticity-led evolution in natural settings is challenging.
  • Urban environments offer unique opportunities to observe these processes.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To document evidence of plastic behavioral changes in urban animals.
  • To analyze how these plastic behaviors facilitate urban evolution.
  • To highlight the importance of behavioral plasticity in urban evolutionary research.

Main Methods:

  • Review and synthesis of existing studies on urban animal behavior.
  • Analysis of case studies documenting various forms of plasticity (learning, developmental, etc.).
  • Application of the behavioral drive conceptual framework.

Main Results:

  • Abundant evidence of diverse plastic behaviors (altered habitat use, activity patterns, courtship) in urban fauna.
  • Plastic behaviors can facilitate and cascade into evolutionary changes via spatial, temporal, and mate-choice mechanisms.
  • Urban environments serve as natural laboratories for studying plasticity-led evolution.

Conclusions:

  • Behavioral plasticity should be integrated more formally into urban evolutionary studies.
  • Urban ecosystems provide valuable settings for investigating the behavioral mechanisms underlying plasticity-led evolution.