Transgenerational Effects of Early Experience on Behavioral, Hormonal and Gene Expression Responses to Acute Stress in the Precocial Chicken
Stress during early life can profoundly influence an individual’s phenotype. Effects can manifest in the short-term as well as later in life and even in subsequent generations. Transgenerational effects of stress are potentially mediated via modulation of the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis (HPA) as well as epigenetic mechanisms causing heritable changes in gene expression. To investigate these […]
Transgenerational Effects of Variable Foraging Demand Stress in Female Bonnet Macaques
Stress coping is an important part of mammalian life, influencing somatic and mental health, social integration, and reproductive success. The experience of early psychological stress helps shape lifelong stress coping strategies. Recent studies have shown that the effects of early stress may not be restricted to the affected generation, but may also be transmitted to […]
Effects of captivity on house mice behaviour in a novel environment: Implications for conservation practices
Captive breeding programmes offer a method for preventing the extinction of threatened species, but often have difficulty establishing self-sustaining populations and generating individuals for release. This difficulty can arise because the behaviour of captive-reared animals differs from wild animals. Whilst the effect of captivity on animal behaviour has been widely reported, few studies have explicitly […]
What role does heritability play in transgenerational phenotypic responses to captivity? Implications for managing captive populations
Animals maintained in captivity exhibit rapid changes in phenotypic traits, which may be maladaptive for natural environments. The phenotype can shift away from the wild phenotype via transgenerational effects, with the environment experienced by parents influencing the phenotype and fitness of offspring. There is emerging evidence that controlling transgenerational effects could help mitigate the effects […]