Blood Parasite Infection Intensity Covaries with Risk-Taking Personality in Male Carpetan Rock Lizards (Iberolacerta cyreni)

Identifying evolutionary and developmental mechanisms underlying consistent between-individual differences in behaviour is the main goal in 'animal personality studies'. Here, we explored whether activity and risk-taking varied consistently between individuals and correlated to various - p...

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Detalhes bibliográficos
Autores: Horváth, Gergely, Martín Rueda, José, López Martínez, Pilar, Garamszegi, László Z., Bertók, Péter, Herczeg, Gábor
Formato: artículo
Estado:Versión aceptada para publicación
Fecha de publicación:2016
País:España
Recursos:Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC)
Repositorio:DIGITAL.CSIC. Repositorio Institucional del CSIC
OAI Identifier:oai:digital.csic.es:10261/146295
Acesso em linha:http://hdl.handle.net/10261/146295
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palavra-chave:Animal personality
Behavioural syndromes
Behavioural type
Individual quality
Lizards
Temperament
Descrição
Resumo:Identifying evolutionary and developmental mechanisms underlying consistent between-individual differences in behaviour is the main goal in 'animal personality studies'. Here, we explored whether activity and risk-taking varied consistently between individuals and correlated to various - potentially fitness linked - male traits in Carpetan rock lizards (Iberolacerta cyreni). Lizards showed significant consistency within both behaviours, implying the presence of activity and risk-taking personalities. However, there were no correlation between activity and risk-taking, neither on the between- nor on the within-individual levels, implying the absence of a behavioural syndrome. We found a strong link between the intensity of blood parasite (Haemogregarinidae) infection and risk-taking: lizards with higher infection intensity took more risk. While we cannot distinguish cause from causative in the parasite intensity - risk-taking correlation - our results are in line with the asset protection hypothesis predicting that individuals with lower future reproductive value should focus on the current reproductive event and take higher risk.