Research report 2004 - Max Planck Institute for Biological Intelligence (Seewiesen site)

Individual sexual behaviour: the (sometimes) decisive role of the mother

Authors
Forstmeier, Wolfgang
Departments

Verhaltensökologie und evolutionäre Genetik (Kempenaers) (Prof. Dr. Bart Kempenaers)
MPI für Ornithologie, Seewiesen

Summary
Zebra finches show remarkable differences in their individual sexual behaviour, and this variation seems to be strongly affected by non-genetic maternal effects. A research group from the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology studies whether mothers strategically program the sexual behaviour of their offspring in response to the current social environment in order to maximise offspring fitness.

For the full text, see the German version.

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