Animal Behavior Essay Example

supported our original hypothesis, if the mirror is at constant motion with the Male Siamese Fighting Fish will have a quicker latency.

We observed that it took the thirty seconds for the male Siamese fighting fish to get in his aggressive state. The fish's gills expanded and his fin speed increased. He would approach the mirror and then seemingly get bored and swim in opposite direction. However the recovery was also much quicker when the mirror was removed after being in constant motion.From this data we concluded that naturally the fish feels more threatened when the mirror is in constant motion following him around the fishbowl. Factors that may have alter the accuracy of our experiment is the distortion of the reflection due to the fishbowl.

We cannot be sure that if the size of the Male Siamese Fighting Fish is also a variable to the stimulus. Discussion: In this lab I learned that there are multiple possible explanations for one animal behavior.This lab made me really think about what were possible reasons a Siamese fighting fish would act aggressively in its environment towards other males, and what would set off such behavior. The myriad of possibilities changed my viewpoint of animal behavior drastically; scientists do not discover the reasons for certain behaviors overnight. Careful study and lots of different variables must be tested before a definite stimulus could gain credibility, then after that, many experiments supporting that hypothesis before it becomes a theory.

An important lesson I learned about experimentation was the importance of keeping certain variables controlled. When we exposed the stimulus to the fish, we had to be very careful to keep the

movement of the stimulus similar to how we had moved all the other ones. If the fish is affected by movement, and we move one stimulus faster than the others, it might react more strongly to that stimulus, misleading us into thinking the color of the cut out is causing the reaction.