Assortative preferences for stripes in danios

doi:10.1016/j.anbehav.2005.02.005

Animal Behaviour

Volume 70, Issue 5, November 2005, Pages 1063-1066

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2005.02.005 Get rights and content

Decisions about joining social groups are often contingent on one's own phenotypic characteristics and those of existing group members. Zebrafish and their allies (genus Danio) vary substantially in the expression of conspicuous lateral stripes. We presented wild-type zebrafish (D. rerio), two artificially selected D. rerio strains with reduced stripe expression, as well as the stripeless D. albolineatus and the striped D. nigrofasciatus, with simultaneous choices between synthetic, computer-animated shoals of stripeless and striped Danio. Each species and strain of Danio preferred the phenotype that most resembled its own, with a strong preference for striped stimuli by fish with dark-stripe phenotypes, and a strong preference for no stripes by fish lacking stripes. Stripes are therefore a key shoaling cue in Danio. Individuals appear to acquire a general preference for stripes, or no stripes, as a consequence of experience with a specific stripe phenotype.

Section snippets

Stimulus Construction

We constructed a synthetic animation of shoaling danios as described in Rosenthal (2000). Stimuli were modified versions of those used in Turnell et al. (2003). All modelling, animation and rendering were done using 3D Studio Max 1.0 (Kinetix, Burlingame, California, U.S.A.) on a Dell Optiplex GXPro computer, using a Targa 1000 board for digital-to-analogue conversion of video signals and vice versa. We used the program to construct a three-dimensional model stimulus based on a photograph of an

Results

Subjects shoaled preferentially with a stripe phenotype resembling their own (Fig. 1). The striped wild-type D. rerio and D. nigrofasciatus showed strong preferences for stripes (D. rerio, t₁₈ = 1.96, P = 0.033; D. nigrofasciatus, t₁₅ = 2.37, P = 0.016). The stripeless D. albolineatus, in contrast, significantly preferred to shoal with stripeless animations (t₂₄ = 2.38, P = 0.013) and a similar but nonsignificant tendency was found in golden mutants of D. rerio (t₂₀ = 1.46, P = 0.079). Leopard mutants of D.

Discussion

Each species and strain of Danio preferred the phenotype that most resembled its own, with a strong preference for striped stimuli by individuals with dark-stripe phenotypes, and a strong preference for no stripes by individuals lacking them. ‘Leopard’ danios, with an intermediate stripe pattern, were intermediate in preference. Like other shoaling fish (Barber et al., 1998, McRobert and Bradner, 1998, Krause et al., 2000, Hoare et al., 2004), Danio show a distinct preference for associating

Acknowledgments

We are indebted to D. Parichy for providing experimental animals and source images for the animations, and to J. Zee for the line drawings in Fig. 1. C. Elmore and T. Homayoun assisted with behavioural trials. We thank R. Engeszer, G. Gerlach, H. Fisher, E. Neeley, D. Parichy and B. Wong for comments and discussion on this manuscript.

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Citation Excerpt :
Shoaling also shows clear diurnal patterns, being expressed more during the day/light (than the dark/night) phase (Paciorek and McRobert, 2013). Zebrafish shoaling choices heavily rely on two factors – the stripe pattern and olfactory cues (Gerlach and Lysiak, 2006; Rosenthal and Ryan, 2005). For example, in the social preference task, striped zebrafish prefer synthetic striped over synthetic stripeless ‘fish’, while fish lacking stripes have a strong preference for stripeless groups (Rosenthal and Ryan, 2005).
Social behavior represents a beneficial interaction between conspecifics that is critical for maintaining health and wellbeing. Dysfunctional or poor social interaction are associated with increased risk of physical (e.g., vascular) and psychiatric disorders (e.g., anxiety, depression, and substance abuse). Although the impact of negative and positive social interactions is well-studied, their underlying mechanisms remain poorly understood. Zebrafish have well-characterized social behavior phenotypes, high genetic homology with humans, relative experimental simplicity and the potential for high-throughput screens. Here, we discuss the use of zebrafish as a candidate model organism for studying the fundamental mechanisms underlying social interactions, as well as potential impacts of social isolation on human health and wellbeing. Overall, the growing utility of zebrafish models may improve our understanding of how the presence and absence of social interactions can differentially modulate various molecular and physiological biomarkers, as well as a wide range of other behaviors.

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Animal Behaviour

Section snippets

Stimulus Construction

Results

Discussion

Acknowledgments

References (23)

How strong are familiarity preferences in shoaling fish?

Animal Behaviour

Learned social preference in zebrafish

Current Biology

Context-dependent group size choice in fish

Animal Behaviour

Oddity and the ‘confusion’ effect in predation

Animal Behaviour

The influence of body coloration on shoaling preferences in fish

Animal Behaviour

Size-assortative shoaling in fish: the effect of oddity on foraging behaviour

Animal Behaviour

Shoal choice in zebrafish (Danio rerio): the influence of shoal size and activity

Animal Behaviour

Parasitism, oddity and the mechanism of shoal choice

Journal of Fish Biology

Familiarity and shoal composition in fathead minnows (Pimephales promelas): implications for antipredator behaviour

Canadian Journal of Zoology

When should males lek? Insights from a dynamic state variable model

Behavioral Ecology

The social organization of fish shoals: a test of the predictive power of laboratory experiments for the field

Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society

Cited by (106)

Social investigation and social novelty in zebrafish: Roles of salience and novelty

Neural crest cells as a source of microevolutionary variation

A pair of cadmium-exposed zebrafish affect social behavior of the un-exposed majority

Sex differences in the expression of aggressive behavior and influences on social choice in zebrafish (Danio rerio)

No evidence for mate copying in Danio rerio

Using zebrafish (Danio rerio) models to understand the critical role of social interactions in mental health and wellbeing