The main outcome which the experiment found was that some of these fish were reactive while others were proactive. The reactive fish were much less aggressive and very timid while the proactive fish were assertive and aggressive. The reactive fish were able to change their behavior as their environment changed. When food was moved around a maze, the reactive fish were much more flexible and could adapt to new situations. Proactive fish on the other hand kept trying to find the food in the first area it was placed and would not look around as if the food should always be in that place that it was. These fish were better at following specific routines, but had difficulty adapting to new conditions.
This study is actually much more important than you would think. Knowing that fish have individual differences can make for a better welfare for the fish on fish farms. We can know change the conditions to allow the fish to thrive in their optimal environments. Scientists are now beginning to understand how fish will react differently to oxygen levels given their "personality" types. This will allow for easier separation of different types of fish and overall a better well-being for fish on fish farms. Being around fish that are similar in their ways, these fish will feel much more comfortable, which ultimately leads to healthier fish.
Posted by Jacob Lafauce
Do you think that smaller, less complex fish like goldfish have the same types of personality traits? I think that any animal that lives in a group setting would have to have some type of 'personality' because of its place in the hierarchy of the group. Do you think that these personalities come just from the way that the animal is treated by others in the group, like how the sparrows we talked about in class produce more testosterone when more or their heads are painted darker displaying dominance?
ReplyDeletePosted by Emily Nobrega
This reminds me a little of Dory from Nemo! Are there certain fish that are more apt to be in one category? Do more complex/larger fish have more ability to remember and learn? I read that some fish will remember noises from captivity when released into the wild. It would be interesting to see this used to help in fish farms.
ReplyDeletePosted by Caitlin Descovich O'Hare
I wonder how much they will actually put this new theory to use in fish farms; will they literally divide up the fish according to "proactive" and "reactive" characteristics and place them accordingly into separate living arrangements? I wonder how they would go about doing that and how much effort/cost it would entail... Fish farms generally have very poor living conditions and no offense intended, I am skeptical about how much they will actually apply this seemingly costly and labor-intensive policy.
ReplyDelete-Posted by Johanna Brophy
This post is interesting. I wonder if there is a difference in the two types of fish's brains, possibly brain mass. Maybe there is a certain gene expression in one type of the fish that is not expressed in the other. The two separate personality traits are very different, and maybe this is not just separate "personalities" but maybe there is a much more in depth difference of the two kinds.
ReplyDeletePosted by Abbie Saranteas
I wouldn't necessarily call this "personality" because, from an evolutionary perspective, these are just ways the fish have adapted to survive to changing or static environments. Personality is more of a human perspective on human life. However, it is quite amusing to associate behavior like this to "personality", as many animated films have adopted.
ReplyDeletePosted by Michael Shi
Personality is a loaded word, because although individuals vary in behavior, in order to vary in personality they must have conscious awareness. Calling variation in behavior "personality" is unscientifically anthropomorphizing, it is a category that is too interpretive.
ReplyDeleteDavid Matos-Magrass
I have fish at home and I can definitely see how this would be true. The more dominant fish are always the first to the food. I did not know that the less dominant ones are more resourceful. I might do some tests and see what happens if I put food in a hard to reach place and see if the small fish will venture to get the food.
ReplyDeletePosted by Caroline Adams
This article was really interesting to me. I would really like to see some experiments stem from these results. Maybe someone could do a study raising fish under different circumstances and to see how different personality types arise, or possibly take a genetics approach and see if there is a difference in the genome of a proactive fish versus a reactive one
ReplyDeletePosted by Michael Thomas
If you looked at the article, personality was the word that the scientist performing the experiment used and while it may not be a perfect fit, definitely gets the point across correctly. As most people with pets will tell you, their animals indeed have personalities, although I am sure this cognitive power is extremely different for varying groups of animals. The fact that two different fish raised the same way will react in opposite manners is pretty cool, and therefore must have to do with gene expression.
ReplyDeletePosted by Jake Lafauce
This is a great post to read because many people think that humans are the only animals that have feelings and personality traits. It is good to know there is information and tests out there that can confirm these different behaviors in animals, such as fish. More importantly, people are taking this valuable information and applying it to create the best outcome for both fish and humans.
ReplyDeletePosted by Ryan Dulmaine