Interacting phenotypes: what do they mean for behavioural ecologists?
An individual’s genotype affects its phenotype and ultimate fitness, but this process doesn’t operate in isolation. What happens when the phenotypes and underlying genotypes of conspecifics interact with, and shape, an individual’s phenotype? Most animals experience a multitude of social interactions and relationships across their lifetimes; a core goal of my research line is to understand how the social environment and the interacting phenotypes contained within it operate to shape animal behaviour, physiology and fitness. In this talk, I will draw on examples from different study systems, from the rolling hills of northern England and the aviaries of Groningen to the thorny southern African bush and finally a tiny island in the Indian Ocean, to explore the physiology-behaviour-social environment-fitness nexus. I will demonstrate how conspecifics can impact hormones, disease, the contents of saliva and even the ageing process, and discuss how these interactions shape the traits that behavioural ecologists observe in nature.
