Mechanisms of Behaviors
Recently, I’ve become deeply interested in the mechanisms that drive decisions to allocate energy toward costly behaviors. Why do some individuals invest heavily in highly demanding behaviors, while others do not? What factors push an individual to exert so much effort into such taxing activities? During my Ph.D., I plan to explore the environmental, hormonal, and neurogenomic underpinnings of parental care to better understand the evolution of parental care strategies.
Evolution of Parental Care in a Pair-living Monogamous Primate (past)
I have recently been working on a project to examine the correlates of monogamous behavior and parental care in primates. Through the Reproductive Ecology Lab and Dr. A. Caccone’s Genetics Lab, we are genotyping a long-term population of Mirikiná (Aotus azarae) to find the genetic variants associated with parental care.
Collaborators: The Owl Monkey Project, Adalgisa Caccone
Mechanisms of Object Recognition
In many bird species, recognizing and rejecting foreign eggs is crucial for avoiding the costly burden of raising brood parasites. This study explores the cognitive mechanisms underlying this behavior by testing how birds use egg shape and color to set their acceptance thresholds. By presenting Eastern Bluebirds and Red-winged Blackbirds with 3D-printed model eggs of varying shapes and colors, we found that shape-based recognition is influenced by species-specific nest sanitation behaviors and the visual appearance of eggs.
Collaborators: Shelby Lawson, Mark Stanback, Mark E. Hauber
Mechanisms Underlying Parental Care and Behavioral Plasticity (present)
What drives an individual to be a good parent? What are the neural mechanisms driving the provisioning or protection of young? How do these mechanisms compare to those of ‘helpers’ in cooperative situations? How plastic are these mechanisms? How much can past experiences shape future behaviors? There is still a great deal to unravel and I hope to explore some of these topics in the near future.