The role of animal personality in the pace-of-life of coexisting rodents

Abstract

The pace-of-life syndrome hypothesis (POLS) predicts that life-history, behaviour, and physiology correlate along a fast to slow continuum. Relationships between POLS domains evolve in response to natural selection and energetic trade-offs at different phylogenetic levels. Access to resources is dependent on movement within a home-range, and differences in movement strategies should arise to accommodate competition among sympatric species and between conspecifics. I examined behaviours relating to home- range movement among sympatric rodents and between sexes. I tested two hypotheses: (1) sympatric rodents will express differences in movement behaviours to accommodate resource competition; and (2) differences in behaviour and physiology will arise between sexes because of differences in reproductive costs. I found differences in behaviour among species, and a uniform expression of traits relating to movement within a home- range between sexes. My results help to understand differences in animal personality, movement patterns and sex-specific strategies in rodents.