title: No personality without experience? A test on Rana dalmatina tadpoles.
abstract: While the number of studies reporting the presence of individual behavioral consistency (animal personality, behavioral syndrome) has boomed in the recent years, there is still much controversy about the proximate and ultimate mechanisms resulting in the phenomenon. For instance, direct environmental effects during ontogeny (phenotypic plasticity) as the proximate mechanism behind the emergence of consistent individual differences in behavior are usually overlooked compared to environmental effects operating across generations (genetic adaptation). Here, we tested the effects of sociality and perceived predation risk during ontogeny on the strength of behavioral consistency in agile frog (Rana dalmatina) tadpoles in a factorial common garden experiment. Tadpoles reared alone and without predatory cues showed zero repeatability within (i.e., lack of personality) and zero correlation between (i.e., lack of syndrome) activity and risk-taking. On the other hand, cues from predators alone induced both activity and risk-taking personalities, while cues from predators and conspecifics together resulted in an activity - risk-taking behavioral syndrome. Our results show that individual experience has an unequivocal role in the emergence of behavioral consistency. In this particular case, the development of behavioral consistency was most likely the result of genotype × environment interactions, or with other words, individual variation in behavioral plasticity.
authors.affiliation: Behavioural Ecology Group Department of Systematic Zoology and Ecology Eötvös Loránd University Pázmány Péter sétány, 1/c Budapest H-1117 Hungary.
authors.forename: Tamás J
authors.initials: TJ
authors.lastname: Urszán
authors.affiliation: Department of Evolutionary Ecology Estacion Biologica de Donana - CSIC c/Americo Vespucio, s/n Seville 41092 Spain.
authors.forename: László Z
authors.initials: LZ
authors.lastname: Garamszegi
authors.affiliation: Behavioural Ecology Group Department of Systematic Zoology and Ecology Eötvös Loránd University Pázmány Péter sétány, 1/c Budapest H-1117 Hungary.
authors.forename: Gergely
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Nagy
authors.affiliation: Lendület Evolutionary Ecology Research Group MTA ATK NÖVI Herman Ottó út 15 Budapest 1022 Hungary.
authors.forename: Attila
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Hettyey
authors.affiliation: Behavioural Ecology Group Department of Systematic Zoology and Ecology Eötvös Loránd University Pázmány Péter sétány, 1/c Budapest H-1117 Hungary.
authors.forename: János
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Török
authors.affiliation: Behavioural Ecology Group Department of Systematic Zoology and Ecology Eötvös Loránd University Pázmány Péter sétány, 1/c Budapest H-1117 Hungary.
authors.forename: Gábor
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Herczeg
keywords: Animal personality; behavioral syndrome; environment; evolution; plasticity
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