The ontogeny of personality traits in the redjunglefowl, Gallus gallus

• Consistent behavioral differences among individuals, that is, personality, are described in numerous species. Nevertheless, thedevelopment of behavioral consistency over ontogeny remains unclear, including whether the personality of individuals is consistentthroughout life, and if adult personality can be predicted already at young age. We investigated the ontogeny of personality in thered junglefowl (Gallus gallus) by scoring personality of hatchlings at 5 time points through adulthood, including before and after themajor developmental stages of becoming independent and sexual mature. We use the conceptual framework laid out by Stamps andGroothuis (2010a) to holistically investigate the observed changes in behavioral response over ontogeny. We demonstrate that meanvalues of behavioral responses changed across ontogeny and stabilized after independence. Rank-order consistencies of behavioralresponses were overall low across independence and sexual maturation. Only in 1 case could low rank-order consistencies potentiallybe explained by different phenotypes displaying different amounts of change in behavior; more explorative individuals decreased inexploration after independence, while less explorative individuals remained so. Correlations among behavior varied across ontogenyand weakened after sexual maturation. Our results demonstrate that both absolute values and consistency of behavioral traits maychange across ontogeny and that individual developmental trajectories and adult personality only to some extent can be predictedearly in life. These results have implications for future studies on personality, highlighting that the life stage at which individuals arescored affects the observed consistency of behavioral responses.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Biologi -- Evolutionsbiologi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Biological Sciences -- Evolutionary Biology (hsv//eng)

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Biologi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Biological Sciences (hsv//eng)

Keyword

behavioral consistency

behavioral syndromes

chicken

development

developmental plasticity

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)