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Correlations between fearfulness and social behaviours in an F7 intercross of red junglefowl and White Leghorn layers

The aim of this thesis was to study chickens of an F7 intercross between red junglefowl and White Leghorn layers in five behavioural tests to see if there were any correlations between traits in the intercross. 80 animals were used (40 males, 40 females); they were tested in a tonic immobility test, an open field, a fear of human test, an aggression test and lastly a sociality test. The results indicate a pair of correlations between the different variables; chickens with long tonic immobility duration were less aggressive, and chickens with a high fear of humans were more social towards other chickens, which could suggest a correlation between fear and social behaviour/aggression. The results from this study also support previous studies showing that one QTL controls chickens’ behaviour in the tonic immobility test based on the correlations found between the variables in the tonic immobility test. Differences between the genders were found in variables that correlated with each other; this could lead to a speculative suggestion that those behaviours are affected by genes on the X-chromosome. There was also a significant relationship between the weight of the male chickens and their behaviour in the open field test and in the fear of human test, in which the heavier males were less fearful than the lighter ones.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:liu-18922
Date January 2009
CreatorsKarlsson, Johanna
PublisherLinköpings universitet, Institutionen för fysik, kemi och biologi
Source SetsDiVA Archive at Upsalla University
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeStudent thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/masterThesis, text
Formatapplication/pdf
Rightsinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess

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