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Age-related reductions in within-individual variation increase the repeatability of mating behaviour

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Abstract

Behavioural ageing patterns can vary among individuals and can predict long-term changes in the extent of among-individual variation in behaviour, resulting in age-related changes in behavioural repeatability. Understanding how repeatability changes with age is important because it offers insight into the age-specific evolvability of a trait. However, age-related alterations in behavioural repeatability can also stem from changes in within-individual behavioural variation. Nevertheless, little is known about the roles of among- and within-individual behavioural variation in age-related changes in behavioural repeatability. In this study, we repeatedly measured mating attempts of individual male water striders (Gerris lacustris) at different times and estimated individual patterns of behavioural ageing as well as age-related changes in within- and among-individual behavioural variation. We found a decline in mating attempts with age in male water striders. Additionally, individual males exhibited diverse behavioural ageing patterns, resulting in varying ranks with age and consistent among-individual variation in mating attempts. Conversely, within-individual variation in mating attempts decreased with age, leading to increased repeatability. This increased repeatability may arise from reduced mating behaviour flexibility or a decline in the maximum number of mating attempts with age. Therefore, we emphasise the importance of within-individual behavioural variation in age-related changes in repeatability, independent of changes in among-individual behavioural variation.

Significance statement

Despite considerable research on age-related phenotypic changes, little attention has been given to individual-level analyses of behavioural changes with age. Here, we show that male water striders decrease their mating attempts with age and also exhibit variation in how their behaviour changes with age. The extent of individual differences in mating attempts was unchanged with age, but the extent of within-individual variation in mating attempts decreased. This pattern results in an age-related increase in behavioural repeatability. Thus, we suggest that age-related changes in behavioural variation should be considered when predicting behavioural evolution.

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Data availability

All data are available at https://shorturl.at/imqHZ.

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Acknowledgements

We thank two anonymous reviewers for improving earlier versions of the manuscript.

Funding

This work was supported by a Basic Science Research Program grant through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF-2022R1C1C1004303) to CSH.

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  1. Chang S. Han

    Present address: Department of Biology, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Korea

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  1. Behavioural Ecology, Department of Biology, Ludwig-Maximilians University of Munich, Planegg-Martinsried, Germany

    Chang S. Han & Niels J. Dingemanse

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Correspondence to Chang S. Han.

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Han, C.S., Dingemanse, N.J. Age-related reductions in within-individual variation increase the repeatability of mating behaviour. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 77, 94 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-023-03368-w

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