Abstract
BackgroundThe expression of animal personality is indicated by patterns of consistency in individual behaviour. Often, the differences exhibited between individuals are consistent across situations. However, between some situations, this can be biased by variable levels of individual plasticity. The interaction between individual plasticity and animal personality can be illustrated by examining situation-sensitive personality traits such as boldness (i.e. risk-taking and exploration tendency). For the weakly electric fish Gnathonemus petersii, light condition is a major factor influencing behaviour. Adapted to navigate in low-light conditions, this species chooses to be more active in dark environments where risk from visual predators is lower. However, G. petersii also exhibit individual differences in their degree of behavioural change from light to dark. The present study, therefore, aims to examine if an increase of motivation to explore in the safety of the dark, not only affects mean levels of boldness, but also the variation between individuals, as a result of differences in individual plasticity.ResultsBoldness was consistent between a novel-object and a novel-environment situation in bright light. However, no consistency in boldness was noted between a bright (risky) and a dark (safe) novel environment. Furthermore, there was a negative association between boldness and the degree of change across novel environments, with shier individuals exhibiting greater behavioural plasticity.ConclusionsThis study highlights that individual plasticity can vary with personality. In addition, the effect of light suggests that variation in boldness is situation specific. Finally, there appears to be a trade-off between personality and individual plasticity with shy but plastic individuals minimizing costs when perceiving risk and bold but stable individuals consistently maximizing rewards, which can be maladaptive.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12983-016-0154-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
The expression of animal personality is indicated by patterns of consistency in individual behaviour
This study highlights that individual plasticity can vary with personality
The effect of light suggests that variation in boldness is situation specific
Summary
The expression of animal personality is indicated by patterns of consistency in individual behaviour. G. petersii exhibit individual differences in their degree of behavioural change from light to dark. The variation is indicated on a continuum ranging from the lowest to the highest level of behavioural response within the population [3] and as such indicates the degree each individual exhibits the behaviour in relation to the rest of the population. This variation can be consistent across contexts (i.e. functional behavioural categories such as feeding), situations Individuals may be more or less flexible over an environmental gradient of changing conditions, i.e. they exhibit variable levels of individual plasticity [19]
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