Daniel Parejo-Pulido, Tomás Redondo, Lorenzo Pérez-Rodríguez
{"title":"Immune challenge reduces begging effort and modifies begging call structure in spotless starling nestlings","authors":"Daniel Parejo-Pulido, Tomás Redondo, Lorenzo Pérez-Rodríguez","doi":"10.1007/s00265-024-03497-w","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>Symptoms of illness offer insights into an organism’s condition, altering social signals that affect others’ behavior. Nestling birds employ begging signals to solicit parental care, but the extent to which begging reflects nestling health beyond hunger remains controversial. We investigated how experimentally induced changes in health affect begging signals in spotless starling (<i>Sturnus unicolor</i>) nestlings. To alter health status, we challenged nestlings by injecting lipopolysaccharide (LPS) -an antigen that elicits an immune response- or a control substance (PBS) and observed begging behavior under controlled food deprivation conditions. LPS-treated nestlings exhibited delayed gaping, reduced stretching, and less begging time compared to control nestlings. Moreover, LPS-treated nestlings produced calls with higher spectral entropy, particularly when deprived of food for longer. Our findings indicate that begging signals are sensitive to induced sickness. However, addressing mechanistic issues is crucial for effectively testing whether begging reflects nestling condition as a signal of quality in future experimental setups.</p>","PeriodicalId":8881,"journal":{"name":"Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.9000,"publicationDate":"2024-07-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology","FirstCategoryId":"99","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-024-03497-w","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Symptoms of illness offer insights into an organism’s condition, altering social signals that affect others’ behavior. Nestling birds employ begging signals to solicit parental care, but the extent to which begging reflects nestling health beyond hunger remains controversial. We investigated how experimentally induced changes in health affect begging signals in spotless starling (Sturnus unicolor) nestlings. To alter health status, we challenged nestlings by injecting lipopolysaccharide (LPS) -an antigen that elicits an immune response- or a control substance (PBS) and observed begging behavior under controlled food deprivation conditions. LPS-treated nestlings exhibited delayed gaping, reduced stretching, and less begging time compared to control nestlings. Moreover, LPS-treated nestlings produced calls with higher spectral entropy, particularly when deprived of food for longer. Our findings indicate that begging signals are sensitive to induced sickness. However, addressing mechanistic issues is crucial for effectively testing whether begging reflects nestling condition as a signal of quality in future experimental setups.
期刊介绍:
The journal publishes reviews, original contributions and commentaries dealing with quantitative empirical and theoretical studies in the analysis of animal behavior at the level of the individual, group, population, community, and species.