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Publication
Sex differences in social buffering and social contagion of alarm responses in zebrafish
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Advisor(s)
Abstract(s)
The alarm substance in fsh is a pheromone released by injured individuals after a predator attack. When detected by other
fsh, it triggers fear/defensive responses, such as freezing and erratic movement behaviours. Such responses can also help
other fsh in the shoal to modulate their own behaviours: decreasing a fear response if conspecifcs have not detected the alarm
substance (social bufering) or triggering a fear response if conspecifcs detected the alarm substance (social contagion).
Response variation to these social phenomena is likely to depend on sex. Because males have higher-risk life-history strategies
than females, they may respond more to social bufering where they risk not responding to a real predator attack, while
females should respond more to social contagion because they only risk responding to a false alarm. Using zebrafsh, we
explored how the response of males and females to the presence/absence of the alarm substance is modifed by the alarmed/
unalarmed behaviour of an adjacent shoal of conspecifcs. We found that, in social bufering, males decreased freezing more
than females as expected, but in social contagion males also responded more than females by freezing at a higher intensity.
Males were, therefore, more sensitive to visual information, while females responded more to the alarm substance itself.
Because visual information updates faster than chemical information, males took more risks but potentially more benefts as
well, because a quicker adjustment of a fear response allows to save energy to other activities. These sex diferences provide
insight into the modifying efect of life-history strategies on the use of social information.
Description
Keywords
Alarm substance Life-history strategies Social bufering Social contagion Sex diferences Zebrafsh
Citation
Akinrinade, I. D., Varela, S. A. M., & Oliveira, R. F. (2023). Sex differences in social buffering and social contagion of alarm responses in zebrafish. Animal Cognition. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-023-01779-w
Publisher
Springer Verlag