1. Color-oriented Neophobia: Corticosterone and Sex Differences in house sparrows (Passer domesticus)
Laken Cooper1, Allen Ross2, Sarah Foltz2, Ignacio Moore2 & Jason Davis1
Radford University1 & Virginia Tech2

2. BACKGROUND “Rhesus macaques show red aversion” (Khan et al., 2011)
Red is also special to humans
- You need to make the back 2 pictures disappear when the top one appears – I did it for you, just look at the animation pane to see how I did it.
Red is rare

3. Red as a signal

4. Why study how house sparrows respond to red?
Do not use red as sexual display
No obligatory contact with red in wild situations
Evidence of sex differences in exploratory behavior
I wonder if we need to add in a slide after this to play up the sex differences aspect…not sure.

5. Initial Behavioral Testing
Approach Test
28 females/ 17 males
Food restricted overnight prior to testing
Exposed to a single red, green, or white food bowl
Color-choice Test
21 females/ 24 males
Food restricted overnight prior to testing
Exposed to a multi-colored pair of red, green or white food bowls.

6. Behavioral Testing Results
Approach Test:
Males were more likely than females to feed, regardless of color (p<0.05).
Birds that fed took longer to approach red bowls than green or white bowls (p<0.05)

7. Behavioral Testing Results
Color-Choice Test:
Males feeding duration was significantly longer than females (p<0.05).
Birds were significantly less likely to approach red bowls than green or white bowls (p<0.0001).

8. Corticosteroid hormones and response to red
Does exposure to red induce a physiological stress response?
Do stress response patterns predict behavioral response to red stimuli?
Are there any sex differences in such patterns?

9. Methods: Red Exposure Food restricted overnight prior to testing
Exposed to either a red or white solid styrofoam wall located on the exterior of the cage.
WILL PUT A
PHOTO HERE
Good.

10. Methods: Blood sampling
Baseline blood samples taken within 3 minutes of capture the day prior to testing.
Birds were then housed indoors overnight.
Testing response samples taken immediately following exposure to stimulus.
Stress response samples collected after birds were placed in a cloth bag for 30 minutes, immediately following end of test.
Analyzed blood samples with an RIA.
Baseline sample
Captured in aviary
Testing sample
Stressed sample
Exposed to color
Bagged
Good, but I’d probably suggest matching the bullets to the timeline; have points on the timeline appear as the appropriate bullets also appear

11. A B
Be consistent in what you call each time point – if you call it “neophobic level” here make sure you call it that on previous slides too.

12. p<0.05

13. p< 0.05
Maybe change to “Female corticosterone levels immediately following exposure to colors” or otherwise make match what you call this time point in previous slides

14. discussion HOSP respond to red differently than green or white.
Corticosteroid response patterns predict behavioral profiles.
Higher cort response to restraint = longer time to approach stimulus
Males and females differ in reactivity to neophobic situations.
Males seem to be less reactive overall
I moved this here because I think the fledgling data should really be treated as pilot/future directions more than the main project

15. Future Directions
Can modulating corticosterone alter behavioral responses to red?
Can modulating sex hormones alter sex typical neophobic patterns?
Other rare colors
When and how do sex and color response differences appear during development?
After you mention the last point you’re ready to end by showing them some pilot data from the fledgling project…then discussing how you want to look at hormones in fledglings and rework the test.

16. Fledgling Color-Choice Test
Recently fledged (summer of hatching)
Exposed to a multi-colored pair of red, green or white food bowls.
ISSUE: Fledglings too hesitant & too mobile to observe any preference pattern
I moved your bullet from “Discussion cont.” here and deleted that slide altogether

17. p<0.02

18. Special Thanks To:
Selu Conservancy Radford University Ecophysiology Lab: Dan Rabago, Erin Dudley, Tara Paterson, Kristan Cale, Blake Hintz, Clint Lexa, Dylan McDaniel, Fionna Surrette.