← Responses of plants and animals to their external environment
9 Social behaviour & spatial behaviour
Every term in this section is named in the NZQA 2026 assessment specification as one candidates should be familiar with. None of them were on this page before. As always, finish each explanation on reproductive success.📖 Required terms: social and spatial behaviour
7 termsStraight from the specification. Cover the right column and recite.
- Home range
- The whole area an animal moves through in its normal activities — feeding, drinking, resting, mating. Not the same as a territory: home ranges may overlap and are not defended.
- Territory
- The part of a home range that is actively defended against rivals, usually of the same species. Defending it costs energy, so it only pays when the resource is worth more than the cost.
- Agonistic behaviour
- The whole set of conflict behaviours — threat displays, ritualised fighting, appeasement and retreat — used to settle disputes. Mostly display rather than injury: both animals do better avoiding a real fight.
- Courtship
- Behaviour that precedes mating: it lets each animal identify a partner of the right species, sex and condition, and synchronises them for mating. Also a reproductive isolating mechanism — links straight to speciation in 91605.
- Cooperative breeding
- Individuals other than the parents (often older offspring) help raise young — feeding, guarding, or defending the nest. The helpers are usually relatives, which is why kin selection explains it.
- Altruism
- Behaviour that costs the performer and benefits another animal. The puzzle it poses: how can selection favour something that reduces your own survival?
- Kin selection
- The answer to that puzzle: helping relatives passes on shared alleles indirectly, so alleles for helping can spread even when the helper reproduces less. The closer the relative, the more shared alleles, the more the help “pays”.
How to explain any of these for Excellence
- Territory: defending it secures food and nest sites → better condition and more offspring reared → increased reproductive success.
- Agonistic display instead of fighting: settles rank without injury → both animals avoid wounds and save energy → both survive to breed.
- Courtship: ensures mating with the right species and a fit partner → no wasted gametes on hybrids → increased reproductive success.
- Cooperative breeding / altruism: helpers raise more surviving young than the parents could alone; because the young are relatives, the helper still passes on shared alleles — kin selection.