Dataset Information

Audience Effects in Territorial Defense of Male Cichlid Fish Are Associated with Differential Patterns of Activation of the Brain Social Decision-Making Network.

ABSTRACT: Animals communicate by exchanging signals frequently in the proximity of other conspecifics that may detect and intercept signals not directed to them. There is evidence that the presence of these bystanders modulates the signaling behavior of interacting individuals, a phenomenon that has been named audience effect. Research on the audience effect has predominantly focused on its function rather than on its proximate mechanisms. Here, we have investigated the physiological and neuromolecular correlates of the audience effect in a cichlid fish (Mozambique tilapia, Oreochromis mossambicus). A male was exposed to a territorial intrusion in the presence or absence of a female audience. Results showed that the presence of the female audience increased territorial defense, but elicited a lower androgen and cortisol response to the territorial intrusion. Furthermore, analysis of the expression of immediate early genes, used as markers of neuronal activity, in brain areas belonging to the social decision-making network (SDMN) revealed different patterns of network activity and connectivity across the different social contexts (i.e., audience × intrusion). Overall, these results suggest that socially driven plasticity in the expression of territorial behavior is accommodated in the central nervous system by rapid changes in functional connectivity between nodes of relevant networks (SDMN) rather than by localized changes of activity in specific brain nuclei.

SUBMITTER: Roleira A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5449763 | biostudies-literature | 2017

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Audience Effects in Territorial Defense of Male Cichlid Fish Are Associated with Differential Patterns of Activation of the Brain Social Decision-Making Network.

Roleira António A Oliveira Gonçalo A GA Lopes João S JS Oliveira Rui F RF

Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience 20170531

Animals communicate by exchanging signals frequently in the proximity of other conspecifics that may detect and intercept signals not directed to them. There is evidence that the presence of these bystanders modulates the signaling behavior of interacting individuals, a phenomenon that has been named audience effect. Research on the audience effect has predominantly focused on its function rather than on its proximate mechanisms. Here, we have investigated the physiological and neuromolecular co ...[more]

PMID: 28620286

Similar Datasets

Project description:Social living animals have to adjust their behavior to rapid changes in the social environment. It has been hypothesized that the expression of social behavior is better explained by the activity pattern of a diffuse social decision-making network (SDMN) in the brain than by the activity of a single brain region. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that it is the assessment that individuals make of the outcome of the fights, rather than the expression of aggressive behavior per se, that triggers changes in the pattern of activation of the SDMN which are reflected in socially driven behavioral profiles (e.g., dominant vs. subordinate specific behaviors). For this purpose, we manipulated the perception of the outcome of an agonistic interaction in an African cichlid fish (Oreochromis mossambicus) and assessed if either the perception of outcome or fighting by itself was sufficient to trigger rapid changes in the activity of the SDMN. We have used the expression of immediate early genes (c-fos and egr-1) as a proxy to measure the neuronal activity in the brain. Fish fought their own image on a mirror for 15 min after which they were allocated to one of three conditions for the two last minutes of the trial: (1) they remained fighting the mirror image (no outcome treatment); (2) the mirror was lifted and a dominant male that had just won a fight was presented behind a transparent partition (perception of defeat treatment); and (3) the mirror was lifted and a subordinate male that had just lost a fight was presented behind a transparent partition (perception of victory treatment). Results show that these short-term social interactions elicit distinct patterns in the SDMN and that the perception of the outcome was not a necessary condition to trigger a SDMN response as evidenced in the second treatment (perception of defeat treatment). We suggest that the mutual assessment of relative fighting behavior drives these acute changes in the state of the SDMN.

Dataset Information

Audience Effects in Territorial Defense of Male Cichlid Fish Are Associated with Differential Patterns of Activation of the Brain Social Decision-Making Network.

Publications

Audience Effects in Territorial Defense of Male Cichlid Fish Are Associated with Differential Patterns of Activation of the Brain Social Decision-Making Network.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets