Week 1 Post 2

Animal Behavior: Sensory and Eyesight

Animal behavior is a very diverse topic. The way animals find food, reproduce, travel/migrate, communicate, etc. are all influenced by their behavior. The way an animal behaves can be very reliant on the sensory structures of the animal; the eyes, ears, and even skin. In "What Functions of Living Systems Underlie Behavior?", Michael D. Breed talks about how an animal's eyesight can actually affect its behavior. Most animals have either monochromatic vision or trichromatic vision. Monochromatic vision is the ability to see in black and white, while trichromatic vision is the ability to see the three primary colors (red, blue, and yellow) and their mixtures. Whether an animal has monochromatic eyesight or trichromatic can affect their behavior. Having monochromatic eyesight gives the animal more sensitivity of light, as they can only see something as dark and light instead of in color. This also makes them reliant on shapes and movements, while trichromatic animals rely on an indication by color. For example, bulls are actually color blind, so when a large red cloth is waved in front of them, they are actually threatened by the sporadic movements of the cloth itself, not its color. The same goes for many trichromatic predatory animals; when they see a brightly colored amphibian (frogs, salamanders, etc.) or snake, they correlate the bright colors with danger and death.

The article "What Functions of Living Systems Underlie Behavior?" showed the relationship between animals' sensory structures and the way they behave by showing that the type of eyesight an animal has directly correlates with the way they react in different situations.  Animal behavior can be connected with many other variables such as stress, hormones, and diet as well; it is a very diverse and complicated topic of science.