Social plasticity and individuality shape variation in contest behaviour.

Area of Science:

• Animal behavior
• Evolutionary biology
• Behavioral ecology

Background:

• Physical contests are crucial for animals to access limited resources like territories and mates.
• Understanding how individual competitive ability influences contest behavior is vital but empirically limited.
• Variation in competitive ability is expected to drive behavioral variation within populations.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate how pre-existing variation in competitive ability influences phenotypic variation in contest behavior.
• To quantify the contribution of individual differences in body size and weapon size to territoriality and aggressiveness.
• To explore the role of behavioral plasticity in response to morphological traits in contest outcomes.

Main Methods:

• Utilized an inbred line of Drosophila prolongata, a territorial fly species.
• Quantified individual differences in body size and weapon size as key competitive ability traits.
• Assessed repeatability of territoriality and aggressiveness, and analyzed behavioral plasticity in response to morphological traits.

Main Results:

• Territoriality and aggressiveness were found to be repeatable individual traits.
• Behavioral plasticity, influenced by focal and opponent morphology, largely explained variation in contest behaviors.
• Identified that individual differences in competitive ability traits contribute to variation in social behavior.

Conclusions:

• Individuals exhibit consistent differences in contest behavior despite identical conditions, demonstrating individuality.
• Behavioral plasticity allows individuals to adjust contest strategies based on social and morphological contexts.
• Micro-environmental variations shaping competitive ability (body/weapon size) are key drivers of both between- and within-individual variation in social behavior.