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- Title
Parental responsiveness negatively correlates with fecal testosterone concentration in male mandarin voles ( Microtus mandarinus).
- Authors
Smorkatcheva, A. V.; Bychenkova, T. N.; Zavjalov, E. L.
- Abstract
The tradeoff between parental effort and mating effort in male animals may be mediated by testosterone (T). The pattern of association between T and paternal care in birds is consistent with this hypothesis, while it is poorly studied and not universal for mammals. We used the correlation approach to test two predictions of T-mediated tradeoff hypothesis for a biparental vole, Microtus mandarinus: (1) that T levels in males decrease from before pair formation to after birth of the first litter and (2) that paternal responsiveness of males negatively correlates with their T levels. T concentrations were measured in fecal samples collected before pairing and then immediately before behavioral testing on day 5 after birth of the first litter. Both nonpaternal and low paternal males had high initial T that decreased after birth of pups, though the decrease was only significant in low paternal males. In highly paternal males, the initial T was low and did not change after birth. Our results support the predictions of T-mediated tradeoff hypothesis and reveal individual variation in hormone–behavior relationship.
- Subjects
VOLE behavior; MICROTUS; ANIMAL sexual behavior; FAMILIAL behavior in animals; TESTOSTERONE; BEHAVIOR
- Publication
Journal of Ethology, 2010, Vol 28, Issue 1, p53
- ISSN
0289-0771
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1007/s10164-009-0154-z