IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/beheco/v25y2014i4p802-812..html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Residual correlations, and not individual properties, determine a nest defense boldness syndrome

Author

Listed:
  • Jon E. Brommer
  • Patrik Karell
  • Kari Ahola
  • Teuvo Karstinen

Abstract

Different behavioral traits often covary, forming a behavioral syndrome. It is poorly known whether this covariance occurs on the between-individual level and what its selective consequences are. We used repeated measures (N = 562 observation events) of individual tawny owl Strix aluco females (N = 237) to study the integrated effects of seasonal timing of reproduction and clutch size on boldness displayed during defense of their clutch, in relation to plumage coloration, including local recruit production as a selective force on these traits. Using a Bayesian multivariate mixed model, we quantified the covariances between these traits on phenotypic, residual, and between-individual level and used a structural equation modeling approach to test the significance of presumed causal relationship between these traits in an a priori hypothesized path. On the phenotypic level, boldness was determined through early timing of breeding and larger clutch size, and early breeding increased recruitment probability. However, this relationship was entirely due to residual covariances and was not present on the between-individual level. The low individual-level correlations did not constrain the capacity of the population to respond to evolution as quantified by average autonomy (a metric summarizing evolutionary constraint on multiple traits). In the tawny owl, the association between early breeding and bold behavior, which is favored by selection, is solely due to extrinsic, nonheritable factors. We conclude that phenotypic evidence is insufficient to demonstrate syndrome covariance.

Suggested Citation

  • Jon E. Brommer & Patrik Karell & Kari Ahola & Teuvo Karstinen, 2014. "Residual correlations, and not individual properties, determine a nest defense boldness syndrome," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 25(4), pages 802-812.
  • Handle: RePEc:oup:beheco:v:25:y:2014:i:4:p:802-812.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/beheco/aru057
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hadfield, Jarrod D., 2010. "MCMC Methods for Multi-Response Generalized Linear Mixed Models: The MCMCglmm R Package," Journal of Statistical Software, Foundation for Open Access Statistics, vol. 33(i02).
    2. Ned A. Dochtermann & Niels J. Dingemanse, 2013. "Editor's choice Behavioral syndromes as evolutionary constraints," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 24(4), pages 806-811.
    3. Renée A. Duckworth, 2006. "Behavioral correlations across breeding contexts provide a mechanism for a cost of aggression," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 17(6), pages 1011-1019, November.
    4. Pekka Kontiainen & Hannu Pietiäinen & Kalle Huttunen & Patrik Karell & Heikki Kolunen & Jon E. Brommer, 2009. "Aggressive Ural owl mothers recruit more offspring," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 20(4), pages 789-796.
    5. Nolwenn Fresneau & Edward Kluen & Jon E. Brommer, 2014. "A sex-specific behavioral syndrome in a wild passerine," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 25(2), pages 359-367.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gabrielle Dubuc-Messier & Denis Réale & Philippe Perret & Anne Charmantier, 2017. "Environmental heterogeneity and population differences in blue tits personality traits," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 28(2), pages 448-459.
    2. Nolwenn Fresneau & Edward Kluen & Jon E. Brommer, 2014. "A sex-specific behavioral syndrome in a wild passerine," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 25(2), pages 359-367.
    3. I. Albarrán & P. Alonso-González & J. M. Marin, 2017. "Some criticism to a general model in Solvency II: an explanation from a clustering point of view," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 52(4), pages 1289-1308, June.
    4. Andrés López-Sepulcre & Sebastiano De Bona & Janne K. Valkonen & Kate D.L. Umbers & Johanna Mappes, 2015. "Item Response Trees: a recommended method for analyzing categorical data in behavioral studies," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 26(5), pages 1268-1273.
    5. Jesse Shore & Ethan Bernstein & David Lazer, 2014. "Facts and Figuring: An Experimental Investigation of Network Structure and Performance in Information and Solution Spaces," Harvard Business School Working Papers 14-075, Harvard Business School, revised Jun 2014.
    6. Weliton Menário & Wendy J King & Timothée Bonnet & Marco Festa-Bianchet & Loeske E B Kruuk, 2023. "Early-life behavior, survival, and maternal personality in a wild marsupial," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 34(6), pages 1002-1012.
    7. Bakar, Khandoker Shuvo & Sahu, Sujit K., 2015. "spTimer: Spatio-Temporal Bayesian Modeling Using R," Journal of Statistical Software, Foundation for Open Access Statistics, vol. 63(i15).
    8. Amoroso, S., 2013. "Heterogeneity of innovative, collaborative, and productive firm-level processes," Other publications TiSEM f5784a49-7053-401d-855d-1, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    9. Kandt, Jens & Leak, Alistair, 2019. "Examining inclusive mobility through smartcard data: What shall we make of senior citizens' declining bus patronage in the West Midlands?," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 1-1.
    10. Hart, Jordan D. A. & Franks, Daniel Wayne & Brent, Lauren & Weiss, Michael N., 2022. "bisonR - Bayesian Inference of Social Networks with R," OSF Preprints ywu7j, Center for Open Science.
    11. Tuomo Jaakkonen & Sami M. Kivelä & Christoph M. Meier & Jukka T. Forsman, 2015. "The use and relative importance of intraspecific and interspecific social information in a bird community," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 26(1), pages 55-64.
    12. Mohamed M. Mostafa, 2016. "Post-materialism, Religiosity, Political Orientation, Locus of Control and Concern for Global Warming: A Multilevel Analysis Across 40 Nations," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 128(3), pages 1273-1298, September.
    13. Alexander Robitzsch, 2021. "A Comprehensive Simulation Study of Estimation Methods for the Rasch Model," Stats, MDPI, vol. 4(4), pages 1-23, October.
    14. Ashleigh S Griffin & Suzanne H Alonzo & Charlie K Cornwallis, 2013. "Why Do Cuckolded Males Provide Paternal Care?," PLOS Biology, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(3), pages 1-9, March.
    15. Jamie Dunning & Terry Burke & Alex Hoi Hang Chan & Heung Ying Janet Chik & Tim Evans & Julia Schroeder, 2023. "Opposite-sex associations are linked with annual fitness, but sociality is stable over lifetime," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 34(3), pages 315-324.
    16. Krieg Sabine & Boonstra Harm Jan & Smeets Marc, 2016. "Small-Area Estimation with Zero-Inflated Data – a Simulation Study," Journal of Official Statistics, Sciendo, vol. 32(4), pages 963-986, December.
    17. Alonso, Pablo J., 2011. "Why using a general model in Solvency II is not a good idea : an explanation from a Bayesian point of view," DES - Working Papers. Statistics and Econometrics. WS ws113729, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Departamento de Estadística.
    18. Jesse Shore & Ethan Bernstein & David Lazer, 2015. "Facts and Figuring: An Experimental Investigation of Network Structure and Performance in Information and Solution Spaces," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 26(5), pages 1432-1446, October.
    19. Jennifer Born & Stefan G Michalski, 2019. "Trait expression and signatures of adaptation in response to nitrogen addition in the common wetland plant Juncus effusus," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(1), pages 1-18, January.
    20. Ryan W. Buell & Dennis Campbell & Frances X. Frei, 2021. "The Customer May Not Always Be Right: Customer Compatibility and Service Performance," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(3), pages 1468-1488, March.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:beheco:v:25:y:2014:i:4:p:802-812.. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://academic.oup.com/beheco .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.