Unknown

Dataset Information

0

Maternal effects impact decision-making in a viviparous lizard.


ABSTRACT: Stressful conditions experienced during early development can have deleterious effects on offspring morphology, physiology and behaviour. However, few studies have examined how developmental stress influences an individual's cognitive phenotype. Using a viviparous lizard, we show that the availability of food resources to a mother during gestation influences a key component of her offspring's cognitive phenotype: their decision-making. Offspring from females who experienced low resource availability during gestation did better in an anti-predatory task that relied on spatial associations to guide their decisions, whereas offspring from females who experienced high resource availability during gestation did better in a foraging task that relied on colour associations to inform their decisions. This shows that the prenatal environment can influence decision-making in animals, a cognitive trait with functional implications later in life.

SUBMITTER: Munch KL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5938558 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

altmetric image

Publications

Maternal effects impact decision-making in a viviparous lizard.

Munch Kirke L KL   Noble Daniel W A DWA   Botterill-James Thomas T   Koolhof Iain S IS   Halliwell Ben B   Wapstra Erik E   While Geoffrey M GM  

Biology letters 20180401 4


Stressful conditions experienced during early development can have deleterious effects on offspring morphology, physiology and behaviour. However, few studies have examined how developmental stress influences an individual's cognitive phenotype. Using a viviparous lizard, we show that the availability of food resources to a mother during gestation influences a key component of her offspring's cognitive phenotype: their decision-making. Offspring from females who experienced low resource availabi  ...[more]

Similar Datasets

| S-EPMC10714757 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC4571680 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC5454248 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC4806899 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC8150041 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC6946886 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC9968293 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC8358194 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC7371422 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC8042952 | biostudies-literature