Classify each of the following descriptions as either a...

Classify each of the following descriptions as either a proximate or an ultimate cause of behavior. For all proximate causes, speculate about a possible ultimate cause of the behavior. a. A surge of epinephrine initiates a flight response in a gazelle. b. Turtles use Earth's magnetic field lines as guides during migration. c. $A$ small mammal ignores low-energy food sources that are difficult to obtain, maximizing energy gain from foraging. d. $A$ bird distracts a predator near its nest, increasing the nestlings' chance of survival.

Classify each of the following descriptions as either a proximate or an ultimate cause of behavior. For all proximate causes, speculate about a possible ultimate cause of the behavior.
a. A surge of epinephrine initiates a flight response in a gazelle.
b. Turtles use Earth's magnetic field lines as guides during migration.
c. $A$ small mammal ignores low-energy food sources that are difficult to obtain, maximizing energy gain from foraging.
d. $A$ bird distracts a predator near its nest, increasing the nestlings' chance of survival.

Key Concepts

Ultimate Cause

An ultimate cause explains the evolutionary origins and adaptive significance of a behavior. It answers why a behavior exists by considering the effects on survival and reproductive success and how natural selection has shaped the behavior over generations in response to ecological and evolutionary pressures.

Proximate Cause

A proximate cause refers to the immediate, mechanistic factors that trigger a behavior. This includes physiological processes, hormonal secretions, neural circuits, and environmental stimuli that directly initiate or regulate behavioral responses, answering the question of how the behavior is produced.

Transcript

00:01 Hi everyone.

00:02 So today we're going to take a deeper look at animal behavior, and we're going to specifically look at so many causes of animals ' behavior.

00:11 So first let's take a look at proximate causes.

00:14 Now, proximate causes are going to answer the question, how.

00:19 So they're going to be mechanical, meaning that they're going to be built into the body in some way.

00:26 So this can be done, for example, anatomically, can be physiologically.

00:44 And so what this means is that this could be a shape of the head.

00:50 It could be a color pattern.

00:52 It could be a venom.

00:53 It's something that the animal doesn't really have a lot of control over, but that is already there and it's built in for them.

01:00 Now another aspect is going to be an ultimate cause.

01:03 And instead of answering the question how, this is going to answer the question why.

01:08 So why does the animal do this? now this is going to usually be evolutionary.

01:16 So it's not necessarily something built into the body, but it's something that could have been learned either directly or indirectly over time.

01:25 And this is usually a response.

01:29 So now let's take a look at some examples because it'll help clear it up a little bit.

01:33 So our first example is going to be the surge of epinephrine, which caused a flight response in gazelles.

01:40 Now we're going to think, is this answering the question how, or is this answering the question why? now, we don't really know why this gazelle is searching.

01:50 It's not saying, you know, as a response from a predator, it's not saying that it just wanted to run really fast, but instead it's saying how, as in this surge of epinephrine, which led to the flight response.

02:05 So this is going to be a proximate cause.

02:10 Now, if we wanted to make it an ultimate cause, we could say that the gazelle observed a predator.

02:19 And this predator led to this fight -or -flight response and the surge of epinephrine...

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