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Variability of behavioral chronotypes of 16 mammalian species under controlled conditions
- Source :
- Physiology & Behavior. 161:53-59
- Publication Year :
- 2016
- Publisher :
- Elsevier BV, 2016.
-
Abstract
- Human chronotypes (differences in preference for early or late rising each day) have been extensively studied in recent years, but no attempt has been made to compare human chronotypes with the chronotypes of other animal species. We evaluated behavioral chronotypes in 16 mammalian species along a body size gradient of five orders of magnitude (from mice to cattle). Individuals of all species were studied under a 12L:12D photoperiod in a thermoneutral environment with food and water available at all times. Rhythms of locomotor activity were analyzed for onset time, acrophase, and robustness. Neither of these rhythmic parameters was significantly related to body size, but onset time and acrophase varied considerably from species to species, thus characterizing diurnal and nocturnal species. Chronotype spreads ranged from less than an hour in sheep to almost 24h in cats, thus extending both below and above the human chronotype spread of 6h. The variability of chronotype (as quantified by the standard deviation of group means) was much larger between species than within species and also larger between individuals of a species than within individuals on consecutive days. These results help situate the matter of human chronotypes within the broader context of variability in the phase angle of entrainment of circadian rhythms in animals.
- Subjects :
- Male
0301 basic medicine
Photoperiod
Zoology
Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
Nocturnal
Biology
Locomotor activity
03 medical and health sciences
Behavioral Neuroscience
0302 clinical medicine
Rhythm
Species Specificity
Animals
Humans
Circadian rhythm
Mammals
photoperiodism
Analysis of Variance
Behavior, Animal
Ecology
Chronotype
Circadian Rhythm
030104 developmental biology
Intersubject variability
Intrasubject variability
Female
Analysis of variance
Entrainment (chronobiology)
030217 neurology & neurosurgery
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 00319384
- Volume :
- 161
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Physiology & Behavior
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....f33c9ae16d7e6a97f301aeb1fe31aca2