Video Transcript
In this video, we will learn what a
behavioral adaptation is and how to distinguish between behavioral, structural, and
functional adaptations. We will describe some examples of
behavioral adaptations in animals and explain how behavioral adaptations aid their
survival or their ability to reproduce within a specific environment.
The animal kingdom displays a vast
range of fascinating adaptations. For example, have you ever wondered
why birds often sing? Well, a male bird who sings louder
than their neighbor might be more successful at mating and pass on his traits to
some offspring. Bird song can also be helpful to
protect territory and ward off rival males. Alternatively, a bird might make a
different call to its friends and family to warn them that there is a dangerous
predator nearby. Making distinct, recognizable
sounds can help these birds escape danger, therefore increasing their chance of
survival. These calls and songs are examples
of adaptations.
An adaptation is a characteristic
of an organism like an animal that makes it well suited to a particular
environment. Adaptations may help organisms to
survive and sometimes to reproduce. There are three different
categories into which we can class different sorts of adaptations: behavioral,
structural, and functional adaptations. Bird songs are an example of a
behavioral adaptation specifically. This type of adaptation involves an
animal taking a specific action or behaving in a certain way, like making a
vocalization to attract a mate. Almost all animals have complex
behavioral adaptations, many of which we do not yet fully understand.
Adaptations, like changes in
behavior, may have many advantages: aiding reproduction, protection against
predators, protection against harsh environmental conditions, and even helping
organisms to find food. Let’s take a look at some examples
of each type of adaptation in an animal that lives in a particularly extreme
environment: the emperor penguin.
Emperor penguins live in
Antarctica, where the average temperature ranges between negative 10 degrees Celsius
and negative 60 degrees Celsius, depending on the region. When you think of penguins, you may
picture them huddling together in large groups, which can contain 5000 penguins or
more. Huddling is a behavioral adaptation
that helps to keep them warm against the cold and blustery Antarctic winds, and the
penguins often take turns in the middle of the huddle.
Alternatively, a structural
adaptation is a specific physical characteristic of an organism that makes it well
suited to its environment, often helping it to survive. For instance, emperor penguins have
many physical features, like thick layers of blubber, or fat, under their skin that
help to keep them warm. On the other hand, a functional
adaptation describes a biological process that an organism performs within its body
that makes it well suited to its environment and likely aids survival.
These emperor penguins take deep
dives up to 500 meters underwater to search for food, which can sometimes take
almost 30 minutes. This is a very long time to hold
your breath. The penguins can dramatically lower
their heart rate, even below ten beats per minute. This functional adaptation helps
them to conserve as much oxygen as possible so that they can keep releasing the
energy they need.
Now that we know some more
information about structural, functional, and behavioral adaptations, let’s take a
look at how some organisms have behavioral adaptations that involve altering their
actions according to changes in their environment.
Adapting to changing conditions is
particularly important in seasonal environments where temperature and food
availability may change dramatically throughout the year. A good example of a seasonal
behavioral adaptation is migration. This term describes how organisms,
especially animals, sometimes move in large numbers from one region to another in
response to seasonal changes in environmental conditions.
When thinking of migration, we
commonly think of bird migration in species like swallows. In the spring and summer, many
swallows tend to nest in the UK as the insects they prey upon for food are
plentiful. As winter approaches, this source
of food begins to deplete in the UK as the weather becomes colder. So, the swallows take action to
ensure they will survive. A vast number of swallows make an
approximately 6000-mile trek from the UK to Southern Africa around September or
October, with many swallows even traveling across the Sahara Desert.
During winter in areas like the UK,
which is in the northern hemisphere, regions in the southern hemisphere like
Southern Africa experience summer. The swallows that survive the
journey to these warmer regions have plenty of food available until the northern
hemisphere’s spring when they can return to the UK once more. Other organisms from tiny insects
to huge whales can also migrate vast distances. Migration might help organisms to
find food, better environmental conditions, a mate to reproduce with, or a mixture
of the three.
Another seasonal behavioral
adaptation you may be familiar with is hibernation. Hibernation is when organisms enter
a state of deep sleep, or torpor, and remain in this dormant sleeping state to
conserve their energy throughout environmental conditions that are too cold to carry
out their normal activities. You might already know that many
mammals like bears and mice can hibernate. But an especially exceptional case
can be observed in the North American wood frog.
As temperatures become too cold for
their normal activities, the wood frogs take shelter in leaf litter to
hibernate. Their heart stops beating, their
brain activity stops, and they even stop breathing. The wood frogs’ body also produces
special antifreeze proteins that prevent their cells themselves from freezing during
hibernation while the rest of their body becomes icy until warmer temperatures
arrive. It’s important to note that though
snuggling up in a nest of leaves is an action the wood frog takes, so is a
behavioral adaptation, the other responses involved in hibernation that we have
described are not.
What type of adaptation do you
think a reduced heart rate, reduced breathing rate, and producing antifreeze
proteins might be? If you said functional adaptations,
well done! These are examples of biological
processes that the organism performs within its body that makes it well suited to
its environment and helps it to survive. It’s good to remember that whenever
an organism has a certain behavioral adaptation, there are probably structural and
functional adaptations at play too in making the organism well suited to its
environment. Eventually, the ice begins to melt
and the North American wood frogs can resume their normal activities, like feeding
and reproducing.
A process that is similar to
hibernation, estivation, occurs in response to especially hot and dry conditions
instead of cold temperatures. This adaptation helps to prevent
organisms from losing too much water and drying out by entering a state of dormancy
until environmental conditions improve. Many animals, including insects,
reptiles, and amphibians, can survive in hot and dry environments, like deserts, or
particularly hot and dry periods like droughts, thanks to estivation. Even some mammals, like the lesser
Egyptian jerboa, can estivate. Like many other desert animals,
this jerboa often digs a hollow, or burrow, in the sand that it can lie in. During especially hot or dry
periods, the jerboa enters a dormant state in this burrow and estivates.
Many organisms have also been shown
to respond to changes on a daily basis, from day to night, with complex
behaviors. Animals that are especially active
during daylight hours are referred to as diurnal, as the word “diurnal” comes from
the Latin word for “day.” The brightness of the day can be
useful, as can the heat of the Sun to animals that cannot regulate their own body
temperature, like lizards. However, daylight can also make
some animals vulnerable to predators that hunt primarily using their eyesight.
Certain animals, like some mice,
adapt to these daily changes by being nocturnal. This means that they are most
active at night, as the word “nocturnal” derives from the Latin word for
“night.” Unfortunately for these mice, there
are also predators that have adaptations to hunt in darkness. For example, some owls hunt their
prey during dawn and dusk, but mostly they hunt at night. This is because their structural
adaptations of incredible eyesight, phenomenal hearing, and almost noiseless flight
allow them to easily detect and then ambush their unsuspecting prey under the cover
of darkness.
Let’s apply what we’ve learned
about behavioral adaptations to some practice questions.
Adaptations can be divided into
three different types: structural, functional, and behavioral. Which of the following best
describes what a behavioral adaptation is? (A) A specific function that part
of the organism’s body carries out to help it survive, for example, a human sweating
when they are too hot. (B) A change in activity that helps
the organism survive, for example, birds migrating to warmer climates in the
winter. Or (C) a physical feature of an
organism that helps it survive in its environment, for example, a predator having
sharp claws.
An adaptation is a characteristic
of an organism that makes it well suited to its environment and often gives it a
better chance of survival. Answer option C states that some
predators have sharp claws. Such features can be helpful to a
predator, like a bear, as they act as tools, which allow them to kill and eat their
prey efficiently. These physical characteristics that
help an organism to survive in their environment are known as structural
adaptations. As this question is asking us to
find the answer option that best describes a behavioral adaptation, this cannot be
the correct choice.
Answer option (A) states that when
temperature increases, humans tend to sweat. This is an example of a functional
adaptation: a biological process that occurs within our bodies, making us well
suited to our environment as it helps to cool us down when our surroundings are too
hot. As this is not a behavioral
adaptation, it cannot be the correct answer to our question either.
Finally, option (B) gives the
example of birds migrating to warmer climates in winter. This is another response to changes
in temperature, though these changes result in an organism changing its behavior, or
actions, to help it to survive rather than a change within the body itself. This is appropriately describing a
behavioral adaptation. So, the correct answer to this
question is (B): a change in activity that helps the organism survive, for example,
birds migrating to warmer climates in the winter.
Let’s try another example question
together.
A puffer fish can swallow huge
amounts of water or air to blow itself up and dramatically increase its size. What benefit does this behavioral
adaptation provide? (A) It hypnotizes the prey of the
puffer fish. (B) It intimidates predators of the
puffer fish. (C) It allows the puffer fish to
camouflage. Or (D) it lowers the body
temperature of the puffer fish.
A behavioral adaptation is a
specific action or behavior that an organism performs that makes it well suited to
its environment and, often, helps it to survive. There are many reasons why an
organism might develop a particular behavioral adaptation: to help them reproduce or
find food, to protect them against the environment or from predators.
We’re told that when the puffer
fish swallows lots of water or air, it vastly increases in size. In fact, when puffer fish carry out
this response, they increase to more than double their original size. This would certainly not make it
easier for the puffer fish to camouflage or blend in. So, we can eliminate answer option
(C), which suggests otherwise.
We can also see that the puffer
fish has a lot of sharp-looking spines on its body that are not nearly so pronounced
before its increase in size. A large, spherical body that is
covered in spines definitely looks more intimidating and would be a real challenge
for a predator to take a bite out of. Preventing predation would
certainly help the puffer fish to survive. And therefore, this seems the most
likely option that describes the benefit of this behavioral adaptation. Therefore, we can deduce that the
correct answer to this question is most likely (B). It intimidates predators of the
puffer fish.
Let’s recap some of the key points
we have covered in this video about behavioral adaptations. Adaptations are characteristics of
an organism that make it well suited to its environment and give it a better chance
of either survival or reproduction. There are three main types of
adaptations: structural adaptations, functional adaptations, and behavioral
adaptations.
Behavioral adaptations are those
that involve a change in an organism’s activity or behavior that make them well
suited to their environment. Sometimes, seasonal changes in
environmental conditions result in behavioral adaptations, such as migration,
hibernation, or estivation. Some daily environmental changes
can also result in behavioral adaptations on a daily cycle, like organisms carrying
out diurnal or nocturnal activities.
