Design and Execution of Animal Behavior Research: An Overview

Abstract

Animal behavior research, like other sciences, adheres to a rigorous methodology of design and execution. It begins with careful delineation of the research questions, objectives and hypotheses. Dependent and independent variables are identified, including behaviors to be measured or manipulated. A research protocol is structured, which casts the variables and animal subjects into the proper experimental design, prescribes appropriate scales of measurement and designates valid parametric or non-parametric statistical analyses. Data collection begins with the choice of appropriate sampling methods and equipment to insure validity, accuracy and reliability. The most robust and powerful data analyses, commensurate with the parameters of the data set, are conducted and interpreted relative to the research hypotheses and questions.

Sensory Impairments and Autism: A Re-Examination of Causal Modelling

“…The literature is replete with references to common low-level behaviours, such as difficulty recognising faces, avoidance of eye gaze, echolalia, hand-flapping or lining up objects. We predict that comparison of individual behavioural profiles, constructed using behavioural primitives-the smallest functionally useful unit of analysis (Lehner 1987;Manning and Dawkins 1998)-would show clustering of behaviours in sub-groups, providing possible pointers to endophenotypes. Profiles could include low-level nonbehavioural characteristics such as cognitive, perceptual or physiological abnormalities.…”

“…Behaviours can be categorised at many levels of analysis, and taxonomies of behaviours have been developed such as the Eshkol-Wachman movement notation (Eshkol and Wachman 1958;Golani 1976), used by Teitelbaum et al (2004) to assess abnormal motor patterns in children with Asperger syndrome. An ethologist working in a novel domain will follow well-established protocols relating to sampling methods and analytical techniques and will identify and define the behaviours of interest at an appropriate level of abstraction (Lehner 1987;Martin and Bateson 1993). In a study of chimp foraging, for example, the definition of behaviours at the level of feeding, sleeping, and vocalising would be appropriate.…”

Observations on Sambar Rusa unicolor (Cetartiodactyla: Cervidae) stags during hard and velvet stages of antler cycle in captivity

“…An 'ethogram', which is a set of terms and descriptions of the behaviour of an animal may be comprehensive of all behaviours of a species or it may be for only one sex, age group or type of behaviour (Lehner 1987). The ethogram presented in this study is adapted with modifications over Roshin (2005) who conducted a similar study on Spotted Deer Axis axis.…”

Videography Reveals In-Water Behavior of Loggerhead Turtles (Caretta caretta) at a Foraging Ground

“…An ethogram, which is essential to understanding animal behavior, is a quantitative collection of objective and mutually exclusive actions (Lehner, 1987;Sakamoto et al, 2009). Despite widespread reliance on ethograms as scientific tools to summarize and compare animal behavior (Lehner, 1987;Scheer et al, 2004;Howe et al, 2015) challenges associated with observing sea turtle behavior have restricted the number of ethograms built for these species (see Hailman and Elowson, 1992 for a nesting ethogram and Okuyama et al, 2013 for an ethogram based on eight turtles with animal borne data loggers). To provide the first ethogram of loggerheads on the Mid-Atlantic shelf foraging grounds, we developed a coding scheme unique to these data through the use of animal behavior analysis software.…”