Why do we study animal behaviour? Evolution and behaviour. Methods of data collection and measurement of animal behaviour.
Ethology, behavioural ecology and sociobiology.
Instinct, the different forms of learning, motivation and incentives, the genetic basis of the behaviour, the classic questions in ethology.
Behavioural ecology: interaction between individual and environment. Activity rhythms and chronobiology.
The feeding behaviour and the antipredator behaviour: two inseparable sides of the animal behaviour. Optimal foraging theory. The spatial behaviour, use and selection of resources.
Reproductive behaviour. The mating systems: polygyny, polyandry, monogamy. Sexual selection, mate choice. The evolution of the secondary sexual characters. Parental care.
Sociobiology: the adaptive value of sociality, the eusociality, comparative analysis of sociality in animals and humans. Sociality and game theory. Communication (visual, auditory, tactile, electric, chemical), dominance (hierarchy and access to resources), mobbing. The evolution of altruism. The concept of fitness of group. Reciprocal altruism and mutualism.
Notes on cultural transmission.