BIOL 2140L 1
Animal Behavior Lab Instruction Sheet
Animal Behavior Lab Instruction Sheet
This sheet walks you through the lab activity for this week. There is a separate “Answer sheet”
that you will complete and turn in to be graded. I suggest that you work through them together.
For example, complete Part 1, and fill out Part 1 of the answer sheet. Then move onto Part 2.
Learning Objectives:
Students will be able to:
1) Describe, define, and quantify animal behavior
2) Complete scan sampling and focal sampling
3) Determine what type of sampling is most appropriate for a given question
4) Construct an ethogram based on observations of an organism
5) Create and interpret an activity budget
When observing animal behavior, you may notice that behavior varies from individual to
individual. For instance, one duck may continually clean its feathers while another almost never
does. One of the tricky things in animal behavior is developing a standardized way to describe
and compare these behaviors.
The first step in this process is to determine how you will record an animal’s behavior. When
you observe a few individuals and not all individuals of a species, you are taking a sample. Two
major ways in which scientists sample behavior are continuous sampling and scan sampling.
A. Continuous sampling—two types:
1) Focal Sampling: The observer follows one individual and records its behavior
for a predetermined amount of time. However, if the observer stops there and
records data from only one individual, variation that may be present between
individuals will not be captured. It is always best to sample multiple individuals,
in order to get a better estimate of what is going on in the entire population.
Focal sampling allows the observer to estimate how much organisms devote to
specific behaviors, but this method is quite time consuming.
2) Group Sampling: Similar to focal sampling, but instead of following one
individual, the observer follows a small group of individuals. When using this
method, the observer is often focused on only one behavior. For example, an
observer may watch a group of ducks for 15 minutes and record data for each
occurrence of tail-wagging by any of the individuals in the group.
B. Scan Sampling: The observer looks at a large number of individuals (perhaps 30
ducks) and records how many are engaged in each kind of behavior. This procedure is
repeated at regular time intervals, for instance once per half hour. Scan sampling gives
the observer a good sense of the variation between individuals, but does not allow him or
her to assign sequences of behavior to an individual.
In addition to selecting a sampling technique, it is important to determine which behaviors you
will record and how to define them. For example, do you just want to look at aggressive
Modified from:
Ploger, B. J. 2003. Learning to Describe and Quantify Animal Behavior. Exploring Animal Behavior in the Laboratory and Field.
Brockmann, J. H., Measuring Behavior: Ethograms, Kinematic Diagrams, and Time Budgets. University of Florida.
This study source was downloaded by 100000852681095 from CourseHero.com on 01-27-2023 13:31:22 GMT -06:00
https://www.coursehero.com/file/83394926/Animal-Behavior-Lab-Instructions-Spring-2021-2-2-1docx/
, BIOL 2140L 2
Animal Behavior Lab Instruction Sheet
behavior in monkeys or do you also want to include cooperative behaviors you see, like
grooming (when one monkey cleans another)? If you are working on a well-studied species, as
you will in Part 1-3, you may find that many behaviors have previously been defined. In species
that are less well studied, scientists often have to define the behaviors themselves based on
observation. This is what you will be doing in Part 4 of the lab.
A dictionary of the names and descriptions of the behavior patterns that constitute a species
behavioral repertoire is called an ethogram.
Lab Procedure:
Part 1: Using an ethogram (~10-15 minutes)
Below is a partial ethogram for capuchin monkeys. This means that it does not have all
behaviors on it, but only some. Read through the ethogram below.
Behaviour Category Definition
Aggression Chasing, biting, hitting or screaming at another monkey. May
include threat displays, such as shaking branches or lunging
at another.
Play One monkey chases or wrestles with another, in a non-
aggressive manner.
Resting alone Lying or sitting away from the group
Resting together Lying or sitting in contact with another monkey
Feeding Searching for/manipulating/ingesting food
Moving alone Locomoting across the ground or in the trees
without another monkey.
Moving together Locomoting across the ground or in the trees
with another monkey.
Watch this video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWeXRL0JZvM), and use the ethogram to
record all of the behaviors you see in the chart below. Please also note and describe any
behaviors you see that do not easily fall within the categories of the ethogram. When you are
done, you can check to see how you did here.
Keep track of the behaviors you see here:
Time List of behaviors seen from the Description of any new behaviors that you
ethogram. see that were not part of the ethogram
Modified from:
Ploger, B. J. 2003. Learning to Describe and Quantify Animal Behavior. Exploring Animal Behavior in the Laboratory and Field.
Brockmann, J. H., Measuring Behavior: Ethograms, Kinematic Diagrams, and Time Budgets. University of Florida.
This study source was downloaded by 100000852681095 from CourseHero.com on 01-27-2023 13:31:22 GMT -06:00
https://www.coursehero.com/file/83394926/Animal-Behavior-Lab-Instructions-Spring-2021-2-2-1docx/
Animal Behavior Lab Instruction Sheet
Animal Behavior Lab Instruction Sheet
This sheet walks you through the lab activity for this week. There is a separate “Answer sheet”
that you will complete and turn in to be graded. I suggest that you work through them together.
For example, complete Part 1, and fill out Part 1 of the answer sheet. Then move onto Part 2.
Learning Objectives:
Students will be able to:
1) Describe, define, and quantify animal behavior
2) Complete scan sampling and focal sampling
3) Determine what type of sampling is most appropriate for a given question
4) Construct an ethogram based on observations of an organism
5) Create and interpret an activity budget
When observing animal behavior, you may notice that behavior varies from individual to
individual. For instance, one duck may continually clean its feathers while another almost never
does. One of the tricky things in animal behavior is developing a standardized way to describe
and compare these behaviors.
The first step in this process is to determine how you will record an animal’s behavior. When
you observe a few individuals and not all individuals of a species, you are taking a sample. Two
major ways in which scientists sample behavior are continuous sampling and scan sampling.
A. Continuous sampling—two types:
1) Focal Sampling: The observer follows one individual and records its behavior
for a predetermined amount of time. However, if the observer stops there and
records data from only one individual, variation that may be present between
individuals will not be captured. It is always best to sample multiple individuals,
in order to get a better estimate of what is going on in the entire population.
Focal sampling allows the observer to estimate how much organisms devote to
specific behaviors, but this method is quite time consuming.
2) Group Sampling: Similar to focal sampling, but instead of following one
individual, the observer follows a small group of individuals. When using this
method, the observer is often focused on only one behavior. For example, an
observer may watch a group of ducks for 15 minutes and record data for each
occurrence of tail-wagging by any of the individuals in the group.
B. Scan Sampling: The observer looks at a large number of individuals (perhaps 30
ducks) and records how many are engaged in each kind of behavior. This procedure is
repeated at regular time intervals, for instance once per half hour. Scan sampling gives
the observer a good sense of the variation between individuals, but does not allow him or
her to assign sequences of behavior to an individual.
In addition to selecting a sampling technique, it is important to determine which behaviors you
will record and how to define them. For example, do you just want to look at aggressive
Modified from:
Ploger, B. J. 2003. Learning to Describe and Quantify Animal Behavior. Exploring Animal Behavior in the Laboratory and Field.
Brockmann, J. H., Measuring Behavior: Ethograms, Kinematic Diagrams, and Time Budgets. University of Florida.
This study source was downloaded by 100000852681095 from CourseHero.com on 01-27-2023 13:31:22 GMT -06:00
https://www.coursehero.com/file/83394926/Animal-Behavior-Lab-Instructions-Spring-2021-2-2-1docx/
, BIOL 2140L 2
Animal Behavior Lab Instruction Sheet
behavior in monkeys or do you also want to include cooperative behaviors you see, like
grooming (when one monkey cleans another)? If you are working on a well-studied species, as
you will in Part 1-3, you may find that many behaviors have previously been defined. In species
that are less well studied, scientists often have to define the behaviors themselves based on
observation. This is what you will be doing in Part 4 of the lab.
A dictionary of the names and descriptions of the behavior patterns that constitute a species
behavioral repertoire is called an ethogram.
Lab Procedure:
Part 1: Using an ethogram (~10-15 minutes)
Below is a partial ethogram for capuchin monkeys. This means that it does not have all
behaviors on it, but only some. Read through the ethogram below.
Behaviour Category Definition
Aggression Chasing, biting, hitting or screaming at another monkey. May
include threat displays, such as shaking branches or lunging
at another.
Play One monkey chases or wrestles with another, in a non-
aggressive manner.
Resting alone Lying or sitting away from the group
Resting together Lying or sitting in contact with another monkey
Feeding Searching for/manipulating/ingesting food
Moving alone Locomoting across the ground or in the trees
without another monkey.
Moving together Locomoting across the ground or in the trees
with another monkey.
Watch this video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWeXRL0JZvM), and use the ethogram to
record all of the behaviors you see in the chart below. Please also note and describe any
behaviors you see that do not easily fall within the categories of the ethogram. When you are
done, you can check to see how you did here.
Keep track of the behaviors you see here:
Time List of behaviors seen from the Description of any new behaviors that you
ethogram. see that were not part of the ethogram
Modified from:
Ploger, B. J. 2003. Learning to Describe and Quantify Animal Behavior. Exploring Animal Behavior in the Laboratory and Field.
Brockmann, J. H., Measuring Behavior: Ethograms, Kinematic Diagrams, and Time Budgets. University of Florida.
This study source was downloaded by 100000852681095 from CourseHero.com on 01-27-2023 13:31:22 GMT -06:00
https://www.coursehero.com/file/83394926/Animal-Behavior-Lab-Instructions-Spring-2021-2-2-1docx/
