DISSERTATION RESEARCH: Sociability and reproductive success in brown-headed cowbirds (Molothrus ater)

在人类内部，人们普遍认为，早期的个性差异塑造了行为的发展。例如，外向者通常寻求与不熟悉的人互动，而内向者总是寻求与更少更熟悉的人互动。因此，个性可能会塑造一个人的行为发展，使他们从小就接触到不同的社会经验。最近，人们越来越意识到，像人类一样，动物也具有人格特征。拟议的研究将调查如何在性格特征，社会性的变化，形状行为发展的褐头牛鹂（Molothrus ater）。像许多其他物种一样，燕八哥依靠社会互动来学习新的技能和行为。社交性描述了一个人寻求与他人互动的倾向。更善于交际的燕八哥会比不善于交际的燕八哥更频繁地接近更多的个体并与之互动。两项研究将调查：1）社交能力的变化是否可以预测青少年燕八哥的成年行为的发展，以及2）早期与更多或更少社交的成年人的经验是否会塑造青少年人格特征的发展。一个新的基于RFID的视频系统将用于这两项研究，以识别个人和记录他们的社会行为在很长一段时间。该系统将允许以一种研究人员以前无法获得的方式测量社交能力和社会行为的细节。统计时间序列模型可以用来揭示一个人的社交能力是如何反映他在生命的第一年里新行为的发展的。在第二个实验中，将使用统计时间序列模型来揭示与更善于社交的成年人的经验是否可以预测青少年燕八哥第一年内出现的成年人般的行为。 这些结果将通过确定个体如何与他人互动和向他人学习，深入了解早期人格差异如何塑造行为发展。http://datadryad.org/

Within humans it is widely recognized that early differences in personality shape the development of behavior. For instance, extraverts commonly seek out interactions with unfamiliar individuals, while introverts consistently seek out interaction with fewer more familiar individuals. Thus, personality may shape an individual's behavioral development by exposing them to different social experiences from an early age. Recently there has been increasing awareness that like humans, animals also possess personality traits. The proposed research will investigate how variation in a personality trait, sociability, shapes behavioral development in Brown-headed Cowbirds (Molothrus ater). Cowbirds, like many other species, rely on social interaction in order to learn new skills and behaviors. Sociability describes an individual's tendency to seek out interaction with others. More sociable cowbirds will approach and interact with more individuals more often than less sociable cowbirds. Two studies will investigate if: 1) Variation in sociability predicts the development of adult like behavior in juvenile cowbirds, and 2) if early experience with more or less sociable adults shapes the development of juvenile personality traits. A new RFID based video system will be used in both studies to identify individuals and record their social behaviors over long periods of time. This system will allow measurement of the details of sociability and social behavior in a way that was unavailable to researchers before. Statistical time series models can be implemented to uncover how an individual's sociability reflects the development of new behaviors over the first year of life. In the second experiment, statistical time series models will be used to uncover if experience with more sociable adults can predict the emergence of adult-like behavior within a juvenile cowbirds' first year. These results will provide insights into how early personality differences shape the development of behavior by determining how individuals interact and learn from others.Data will be stored and available at http://datadryad.org/