Personality and behavioral syndromes in insects and spiders

Abstract

The field of animal behavior has experienced a surge of studies focusing on functional differences among individuals in their behavioral tendencies (‘animal personalities’) and the relationships between different axes of behavioral variation (‘behavioral syndromes’). Many important developments in this field have arisen through research using insects and other terrestrial arthropods, in part, because they present the opportunity to test hypotheses not accessible in other taxa. This chapter reviews how studies on insects and spiders have advanced the study of animal personalities by describing the mechanisms underlying the emergence of individual variation and their ecological consequences. Furthermore, studies accounting for animal personalities can expand our understanding of phenomena in insect science like metamorphosis, eusociality, and applied insect behavior. In addition, this chapter serves to highlight some of the most exciting issues at the forefront of our field and to inspire entomologists and behaviorists alike to seek the answers to these questions.