CH. 13 - Animal Behavior

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Keywords

1. Patterns of Animal Behavior

1. Circadian rhythm - daily cycle of behavior like eating, sleeping, etc

2. Complex reflexes - a response that involves the brainstem or cerebrum

3. Environmental rhythms - patterns of behavior in response to environmental stimuli

4. Fixed-action patterns - innate behavior in response to certain stimuli

5. Releaser - stimulus that elicits innate behavior

6. Reticular activating system - a complex reflex response with interactions of many neuron, pathway to respond to danger, name calling, etc

7. Simple Reflex - 2 neuron pathway of afferent neuron to efferent neuron

2. Learning

1. Conditioned reflex - response following a previously neutral stimulus

2. Conditioned stimulus - previously neutral stimulus now connected to a conditioned reflex

3. Discrimination - ability to discriminate similar stimuli

4. Extinction - graduation elimination of conditioned responses

5. Generalization - responding to stimuli that are similiar

6. Habit Family Hierarchy - a set of responses with a stimulus, hierarchy of behavior

7. Habituation - suppression of normal responses to overexposure of stimuli

8. Negative Reinforcement - removing unpleasant stimulus after behavior

9. Operant Conditioning - conditioning response with reinforcements

10. Pavlovian Conditioning - linking a neutral stimulus to an unconditional reflex by association

11. Positive Reinforcement - reward when behavior is performed

12. Pseudoconditioning - the stimulus wasn't neutral to begin with, thus not a true Pavlovian classical conditioning

13. Punishment - associating pain and hurt after a behavior

14. Unconditioned reflex - salivation in response to food

15. Unconditioned stimulus - food to a dog will stimulate salivation

16. Spontaneous recovery - if stimulus no longer applied, response will return to normal

3. Limits of Behavior Change

1. Critical Period - specific time period when proper environment pattern must be presented for development to be complete

2. Imprinting - during critical period of development, an object becomes accepted permanently as an element in their behavioral pattern.  Konrad Lorenz discovered.

4. Intraspecific Interactions

1. Behavior Displays - innate behavior used as signal for communication for same specie

2. Olfactory sense - using smell or chemical detection as mean of communication

3. Pecking Order - minimizes violent intraspecific aggressions by establishing an order

4. Primer Pheromones - long term behavioral and physiological alteration in recipient

5. Releaser Pheromones - trigger reversible behavior change in the recipient

6. Territoriality - member of specie defending limited area against intrusion by other

  

Patterns of Animal Behavior

1. Simple reflexes

1. Simple, automatic response to simple stimuli

2. Controlled at the spinal cord by 2 neuron pathway

1. Receptor (afferent neuron) to the motor (efferent neuron)

3. Important for lower animals for quick response, not so for higher animals

2. Complex reflexes

1. Neural integration at higher level

1. Might include brainstem or even cerebrum

2. High animal being "Startled"

1. Triggers a whole series of flight or fight response pattern

2. System termed "reticular activating system"

3. Fixed-Action Patterns

1. Complex, coordinated, innate behavioral responses to stimulation in environment

2. Stimulus is referred to as "releaser"

3. Can't be modified by learning since it's innate

4. Stimuli for trigger the response can be modified

5. ie. Retrieval and maintenance of female birds to egg

4. Behavior Cycles

1. Circadian rhythms

1. Daily cycles of behavior

2. They lose their exact 24 hour periodicity if they are isolated from light and dark

1. Will continue approximately

3. Daily cycle of eating is a good example

1. By clock, we know when to eat

2. By the grumbling of stomach, we know to eat

5. Environmental Rhythms

1. Behavior and maintained by environment stimuli

2. Human example would be responding to traffic light

Learning

1. General

1. Learning is to become adaptive to the environment

2. Complex phenomenon that happens to some extent in all animals

1. Lower animals have more instincts and learning play is relatively minor

2. Higher animals, majority of behaviors are learned

3. Capacity for learning adaptive responses correlate with the degree of neurological development

2. Habituation

1. Suppression of startle response to stimuli

1. By repeating the same stimulation will decrease responsiveness to that particular stimuli

2. Spontaneous recovery - if the stimulus is not regularly applied, the response will recover

3. Classical Conditioning

1. General

1. Pavlovian conditioning associates normal autonomic response with environmental stimulus

2. Also called conditioned reflex

1. The innate stimulus for the reflex is replaced by one chosen by experimenter

2. Pavlov's Experiments

1. Studied salivation reflex in dogs

1. If dog is presented with a bell (conditioned stimulus) then food (unconditional stimulus)

1. The dog will salivate (unconditioned response) eventually until the bell (conditioned stimulus) will elicits (unconditioned response) by itself

2. Neutral stimulus - stimulus that will not by itself elicit the response prior to conditioning

3. The product of the conditioning experience is termed the conditioned reflex

4. Conditioning - establishment of a new reflex by addition of a new previously neutral stimulus to the set of stimuli that triggers the response

3. Pseudoconditioning

1. The neutral stimulus isn't neutral at all, but rather elicit the response even before conditioning

4. Operant or Instrumental Conditioning

1. General

1. Conditioning response to stimuli with reinforcements

2. When animal exhibit good behavior patterns, reward is given

3. Operant conditioning been successfully applied to visceral responses like heartbeat changing

2. Experiments of B.F. Skinner

1. The original experiment is called "Skinner Box"

1. Cage with lever and a food dispenser

2. Food pellet delivered when animal presses the lever

2. Positive reinforcement

1. Providing food, light, or electrical stimulation to pleasure centers when desired behavior is performed

2. Following reinforcement, animal more likely to repeat the desired behavior response

3. Negative Reinforcement

1. Removing unpleasant stimulus following the desired behavior

4. Punishment

1. Painful result when undesirable behavior is performed

2. Animal develops negative connection between stimulus and response

5. Habit Family Hierarchy

1. Stimulus associated with several possible responses

1. These responses are in a hierarchy

2. A chicken may respond to light in many ways, but if one response is rewarded, it'd occur with higher probability in the future

3. Reward will raise its order in the hierarchy

4. Punishment will lower the order in the hierarchy

5. Modifications of Conditioned Behavior

1. Extinction

1. Gradual elimination of conditioned responses in the absence of reinforcement

2. In operant conditioning, response is diminished and eventually eliminated.  But it is not unlearned since it will rapidly reappear soon as reinforcement appears

3. In classical conditioning, conditioned stimulus must be paired with unconditioned stimulus else it'd eventually extinct. 

1. However, at times, conditioned stimulus may elicit the conditioned reflex in what's called "spontaneous recovery"

2. Generalization and Discrimination

1. Stimulus generalization is where conditioned organism will response to similar stimuli but not identical

2. Stimulus discrimination is where conditioned organism will not respond to similar stimuli

Limits of Behavioral Change

1. Imprinting

1. Discovered by Konrad Lorenz when he swam in pond with duckling separated from mother

1. A critical period early in development where behavior pattern is accepted permanently in their behavior pattern

2. Critical Period

1. Specific time period where animal's behavior pattern must have proper environmental cue for pattern to be developed properly

Intraspecific Interactions

1. Behavioral Displays

1. Innate behavior that is a signal for communication

1. Can be a song, call, or change in behavior patterns

2. Reproductive displays - complex patterns as signals in preparation for mating

3. Agonistic display

1. display of appeasement, like when dog wags its tail

2. It involves a contest of some kind, both threatening and submissive behaviors

3. Antagonistic behavior - showing signs of pissed off

4. Other displays might be to convey information about quality and location of food sources

2. Pecking Order

1. Dominant member of the species will get the first right over the subordinate

2. Minimizes violent intraspecific aggressions

3. Territoriality

1. Defense of a certain area from intrusions from other members of the specie

2. Serve to distribute the species so resources not depleated

4. Response to Chemicals

1. Olfactory senses as a mean of communication in animals

2. Pheromones that affects behavior on other members of same species

1. Releaser Pheromones - trigger reversible behavioral change in recipient

Primer Pheromones - produce long term behavioral and physiological alteration in recipient animal