Fighting cichlids: network analysis as a new tool to understand female and male aggression.

SCAIA FLORENCIA; SOMOZA GUSTAVO; MATIAS PANDOLFI

Congreso; II Reunión Biología del Comportamiento del Cono Sur; 2019

Historically, aggression has been studied in males and it has been linked to androgens asmain regulators of this behavior. Despite females from different species also display thisbehavior, aggression has been usually studied in males and female aggression is stillunderstudied. Recent evidence suggests that the key step regulating aggression involvesaromatization to estrogens, but there is still little evidence on this regard. The challengehypothesis suggests that behavioral interactions lead to an increase in plasma androgenlevels in response to social instability. Cichlasoma dimerus is a Neotropical cichlid with biparentalbehavior, in which both males and females show aggressive behavior. The aims ofthis study were: a) to determine whether there is a relationship between sex steroid levelsand intrasexual aggression; b) to perform network correlation analysis of morphometric andhormonal variables in order to get insight into the individual variability in aggressivebehavior. Sex steroids were determined in plasma before and after intrasexual dyadicagonistic encounters and morphometric variables were measured. All agonistic interactionswere recorded for one hour and aggressive and submissive displays were determined ineach animal. Initial estradiol plasma levels can predict aggression in females, but not inmales. Moreover, during male encounters there was not only an increase in androgen levelsbut also in estradiol levels, suggesting that the challenge hypothesis could be extended toestrogens. Finally, network correlation analysis suggests that morphometric and hormonalvariables can differentially explain individual aggression not only in males but also infemales.