Rianne Pinxten

• University of Antwerp

How individual differences translate into group outcomes is a controversial issue and depends on the phenotypic composition of the group. Research on the effect of within-group homogeneity/heterogeneity in phenotypic composition provided contrasting results, with some studies supporting benefits of homogeneity and others the opposite. We characteri...

Artificial light at night (ALAN) and noise pollution are two important stressors associated with urbanisation that can have a profound impact on animal behaviour and physiology, potentially disrupting biological rhythms. Although the influence of ALAN and noise pollution on daily activity patterns of songbirds has been clearly demonstrated, studies...

Birds have evolved a variety of antipredator strategies, which have been extensively studied during day-time. Yet, how diurnal birds directly respond to nocturnal predation threats remains largely elusive, despite that predation risk can be high during both night- and day-time. One form of antipredator behaviour found in several tit species when co...

Anthropogenic environmental change is introducing a suite of novel disturbance factors, which can have wide-ranging effects on mean behavior and behavioral repeatability. For example, exposure to sensory pollutants, such as anthropogenic noise and artificial light at night (ALAN), may affect consistent and repeatable individual-level timing of dail...

Background Evolution is a unifying theme in biology and its understanding is essential to address sustainability problems. However, many people across the world do not understand evolution. Textbooks are among the most widely used educational resources and the way they depict evolution may greatly impact students’ scientific literacy in evolution....

The contribution of school curricula to public understanding and acceptance of evolution is still mostly unknown, due to the scarcity of studies that compare the learning goals present in different curricula. To overcome this lack of data we analysed 19 school curricula (18 European and one from Israel) to study the differences regarding the inclus...

The contribution of school curricula to public understanding and acceptance of evolution is still mostly unknown, due to the scarcity of studies that compare the learning goals present in different curricula. To overcome this lack of data we analysed 19 school curricula (18 European and one from Israel) to study the differences regarding the inclus...

Aggression plays a crucial role in deterring predators and securing resources to promote fitness. Nevertheless, studies focussing on female aggression remain scarce. In songbirds, aggression is prevalent during the breeding season, when same-sex individuals compete for limited resources. Additionally, females of some bird species exhibit snake-like...

Simple Summary Animals use aggressive behaviour to gain access to resources such as food and mates, and protect their offspring. Individuals vary in the way they express aggression during a conflict. However, our understanding of female aggression is limited. In this study, we investigated male and female aggression towards opponents of the same an...

Identifying the environmental drivers of variation in fitness‐related traits is a central objective in ecology and evolutionary biology. Temporal fluctuations of these environmental drivers are often synchronized at large spatial scales. Yet, whether synchronous environmental conditions can generate spatial synchrony in fitness‐related trait values...

How individual differences translate into group outcomes is a timely and debated issue. Recent studies, especially in social arthropods and fish, focus on diversity of personality traits. These studies suggest that the phenotypic group assortment by personality type of an animal group, including the presence of keystone individuals, leads to group-...

Rapid anthropogenic transformation of environments exposes organisms to diverse disturbance factors, including anthropogenic noise pollution and artificial light at night (ALAN). These sensory pollutants interfere with acquisition of, and response to, environmental cues and can be perceived as stressors. Noise pollution and ALAN are often experienc...

Global developments ask for 21st-century skills. Creativity is one of those and can be defined as the production of novel ideas by connecting entities that have not been connected before and whose connection is useful in a certain domain. The growth of rhizomes is an example where unconnected entities become connected in an unpredictable way, and b...

Understanding underlying genetic variation can elucidate how diversity in behavioral phenotypes evolves and is maintained. Genes in the serotonergic signaling pathway, including the serotonin transporter gene ( SERT ), are candidates for affecting animal personality, cognition and fitness. In a model species, the great tit ( Parus major ), we reeva...

Background Investigations of evolution knowledge and acceptance and their relation are central to evolution education research. Ambiguous results in this field of study demonstrate a variety of measuring issues, for instance differently theorized constructs, or a lack of standardized methods, especially for cross-country comparisons. In particular,...

Quantifying variation in behaviour-related genes provides insight into the evolutionary potential of repeatable among-individual variation in behaviour (i.e. personality). Yet, individuals typically also plastically adjust their behaviour in response to environmental conditions and/or age, thereby complicating the detection of genotype-phenotype as...

Relatively little information is available regarding the level of evolution acceptance and knowledge in Europe. The present study fills this gap and provides a comprehensive overview of the current state of research regarding the relationship between evolutionary knowledge and acceptance of students and teachers across Europe, based on a systematic...

Anthropogenic noise is an ubiquitous disturbance factor, which, owing to the extensive nature of transportation networks, and ability of sound waves to penetrate distances, has wide-reaching impacts on biological communities. Research effort on biological effects of anthropogenic noise is extensive, but has focused on waking behavior, and to our kn...

The lack of standardised assessment of evolutionary knowledge and acceptance of evolution across Europe makes comparisons between studies difficult. The Evolution Education Questionnaire on Acceptance and Knowledge (EEQ) was constructed to measure attitudes and understanding across Europe and beyond. We aimed to compile a brief instrument to allow...

Personality (i.e., among-individual variation in average behavior) often covaries with fitness, but how such personality-fitness relationships come about is poorly understood. Here, we explore potential mechanisms by which two female personality traits (female-female aggression and female nest defense as manifested by hissing behavior) were linked...

Behaviour is often both repeatable among individuals (i.e. personality) and plastically adjusted within individuals according to environmental conditions or age. Yet, little is known about the repeatability and age-related plasticity in behavioural traits across the lifetime of free-living animals, which is, however, crucial for understanding the d...

Anthropogenic noise exposure has well-documented behavioral, physiological and fitness effects on organisms. However, whether different noise regimes evoke distinct responses has rarely been investigated, despite implications for tailoring noise mitigation policies. Urban animals might display low responsiveness to certain anthropogenic noise regim...

Background Relatively little information is available regarding the level of acceptance of evolution and knowledge about evolution in different educational settings in Europe. The aim of the present study is to fill this gap and provide a comprehensive overview of the current state of research regarding evolutionary knowledge and acceptance of stud...

We studied the relationship between temperature and the coexistence of great tit Parus major and blue tit Cyanistes caeruleus, breeding in 75 study plots across Europe and North Africa. We expected an advance in laying date and a reduction in clutch size during warmer springs as a general response to climate warming and a delay in laying date and a...

Despite growing research effort, we have a limited understanding of how urban disturbance factors affect cognitive traits, such as innovative problem-solving. We performed an initial assessment of how metal pollution and urbanization levels on territories are related to problem-solving performance in urban great tits (Parus major), by presenting an...

Secondary school teaching of evolution through natural selection is very important because for most people, it is the only formal introduction to the scientific understanding of this theory. However, there are major concerns over its unsatisfactory teaching. In several European countries, including the Flanders region in Belgium, natural selection...

Growing evidence suggests that anthropogenic noise has deleterious effects on the behavior and physiology of free-living animals. These effects may be particularly pronounced early in life, when developmental trajectories are sensitive to stressors, yet studies investigating developmental effects of noise exposure in free-living populations remain...

The evolution and function of female trait exaggeration in species with traditional sex roles are poorly understood. Competition for social and ecological resources, rather than mating opportunities, may be a key selection pressure in females of socially monogamous species. Moreover, such pre-existing resource competition-selected traits (armaments...

Artificial light at night (ALAN) can disrupt adaptive patterns of physiology and behavior that promote high fitness, resulting in physiological stress and elevation of steroid glucocorticoids (corticosterone, CORT in birds). Elevated CORT may have particularly profound effects early in life, with the potential for enduring effects that persist into...

Comprehensively understanding the factors affecting physiology and fitness in urban wildlife requires concurrently considering multiple stressors. To this end, we simultaneously assessed how metal pollution and proximity to roads affect body condition and telomere shortening between days 8 and 15 of age in nestling great tits (Parus major), a commo...

Rapid urbanization is a global phenomenon that is increasingly exposing organisms to novel stressors. These novel stressors can affect diverse aspects of organismal function, including development of condition-dependent ornaments, which play critical roles in social and sexual selection. We investigated the relationship between metal pollution, pro...

Metal pollution is a global problem, which threatens to seriously disrupt behavioral patterns and health in humans and wildlife. Nonetheless, little is known regarding how exposure to metal pollution affects animal personalities, as defined by repeatable among-individual differences in behavior. We used a large dataset to investigate the relationsh...

Predation is the primary source of reproductive failure in many avian taxa and nest defence behaviour against predators is hence an important aspect of parental investment. Nest defence is a complex trait that might consistently differ among individuals (personality), while simultaneously vary within individuals (plasticity) according to the reprod...

Artificial light at night (ALAN) is an increasingly pervasive anthropogenic disturbance factor. ALAN can seriously disrupt physiological systems that follow circadian rhythms, and may be particularly influential early in life, when developmental trajectories are sensitive to stressful conditions. Using great tits (Parus major) as a model species, w...

Animal personalities, as defined by repeatable among individual differences in behavior, can vary across urbanization gradients. However, how urbanization affects personalities remains incompletely understood, especially because different urban stressors could affect personality traits in opposing ways, whereas most previous studies have considered...

Light pollution or artificial light at night (ALAN) is an increasing, worldwide challenge that affects many aspects of animal behaviour. Interestingly, the response to ALAN varies widely among individuals within a population and variation in personality (consistent individual differences in behaviour) may be an important factor explaining this vari...

Coexistence between great tits Parus major and blue tits Cyanistes caeruleus , but also other hole‐nesting taxa, constitutes a classic example of species co‐occurrence resulting in potential interference and exploitation competition for food and for breeding and roosting sites. However, the spatial and temporal variations in coexistence and its con...

Teacher education institutes are in search of alternative models of field experiences, inspired by collaborative learning. This study examines team teaching. We focus upon the assistant teaching model, in which the student teacher assists the mentor during teaching. We investigate which assisting activities student teachers prefer, how student teac...

Anthropogenic contaminants could alter traits central to animal behavioral types, or personalities, including aggressiveness, boldness and activity level. Lead and other toxic metals are persistent inorganic pollutants that affect organisms worldwide. Metal exposure can alter behavior by affecting neurology, endocrinology, and health. However, the...

Artificial light at night (ALAN) is a widespread and increasing environmental pollutant with known negative impacts on animal physiology and development. Physiological effects could occur through sleep disruption and deprivation, but this is difficult to quantify, especially in small developing birds. Sleep loss can potentially be quantified by usi...

Light pollution is an ever increasing worldwide problem disrupting animal behavior. Artificial light at night (ALAN) has been shown to affect sleep in wild birds. Even cavity‐nesting bird species may be affected when sleeping inside their cavity. Correlational studies suggest that light from outside the cavity/nest box, for example from street ligh...

Individuals from different taxa, including songbirds, differ consistently in behaviour and personality when facing different situations. Although our understanding of animal behaviour has increased, knowledge about between-individual differences in cognitive abilities is still limited. By using an experimental approach and a free-living songbird (P...

Exploration score and Clutch size for individuals tested during playback experiment. (PDF)

Results for all linear mixed effect models run during statistical analysis. (PDF)

Behavioural responses during playback experiment. (PDF)

Pearson pair-wise correlation between behavioural responses. Text in bold represents significant values. (PDF)

Description of PhD project on the effects of artificial light at night

Artificial light at night (ALAN) or light pollution is an increasing and worldwide problem. There is growing concern that because of the disruption of natural light cycles, ALAN may pose serious risks for wildlife. While ALAN has been shown to affect many aspects of animal behaviour and physiology, few studies have experimentally studied whether in...

Light pollution or artificial light at night (ALAN) is an increasing anthropogenic environmental pollutant posing an important potential threat for wildlife. Evidence of its effects on animal physiology and behaviour is accumulating. However, in order to effectively mitigate light pollution it is important to determine which factors contribute to t...

Males often express traits that improve competitive ability, such as aggressiveness. Females also express such traits but our understanding about why is limited. Intraspecific aggression between females might be used to gain access to reproductive resources but simultaneously incurs costs in terms of energy and time available for reproductive activ...

Ouyang et al. (2017; hereafter O2017) claim to have offered evidence that light pollution affects the health of free-living great tits (Parus major). Since 2012, they illuminated forests with either white, green, red or no artificial light at night (ALAN; Figure 1). Individuals in the white light treatment showed an increase in nightly activity in...

Urbanization is associated with dramatic increases in noise and light pollution, which affect animal behaviour, physiology and fitness. However, few studies have examined these stressors simultaneously. Moreover, effects of urbanization during early-life may be detrimental but are largely unknown. In developing great tits (Parus major), a frequentl...

Increasing urbanization is responsible for road-related pollutants and causes an unprecedented increase in light and noise pollution, with potential detrimental effects for individual animals, communities and ecosystems. These stressors rarely act in isolation but studies dissecting the effects of these multiple stressors are lacking. Moreover, stu...

Although many studies have investigated organohalogenated contaminants (OHCs) in yolk, little is known about the mechanisms and timing of transfer of OHCs from the female to the egg. Vitellogenin, a yolk precursor, has been suggested to play a role in this transport. We here report for the first time the temporal changes in OHC and an index of vite...

Personality traits and behavioural syndromes are often assumed to relate to life history strategies and lifetime fitness variation and hence may be generally under selection. Key in this regard is the, often untested, assumption that individual differences in (correlated) behaviours are maintained across contexts and over an individual's lifetime....

There is substantial interest of evolutionary ecologists in the proximate mechanisms that modulate vocal communication. In recent times, there has been growing interest in the role of oxidative stress as a mediator of avian song expression. Here, we tested whether the experimental inhibition of the synthesis of a key cellular antioxidant (glutathio...

Artificial light at night (ALAN), termed light pollution, is an increasingly important anthropogenic environmental pressure on wildlife. Exposure to unnatural lighting environments may have profound effects on animal physiology, particularly during early life. Here, we experimentally investigated for the first time the impact of ALAN on body mass a...

Song is a sexually selected trait that is thought to be an honest signal of the health condition of an individual in many bird species. For species that breed opportunistically, the quantity of food may be a determinant of singing activity. However, it is not yet known whether the quality of food plays an important role in this respect. The aim of...

Dataset of the study: Positive effect of dietary lutein and cholesterol on the undirected song activity of an opportunistic breeder

In 1963, the Nobel Prize-winning ethologist Niko Tinbergen proposed a framework for the scientific study of animal behaviour by outlining four questions that should be answered to have a complete understanding: causation, ontogeny, function and evolution. At present, Tinbergen’s framework is still considered the best way to guide animal behavioural...

Artificial light at night (ALAN), termed light pollution, is an increasingly important anthropogenic environmental pressure on wildlife. Exposure to unnatural lighting environments may have profound effects on animal physiology, particularly during early life. Here, we experimentally investigated for the first time the impact of ALAN on body mass a...

Song is a sexually selected trait that is thought to be an honest signal of the health condition of an individual in many bird species. For species that breed opportunistically, the quantity of food may be a determinant of singing activity. However, it is not yet known whether the quality of food plays an important role in this respect. The aim of...

Song is a sexually selected trait that is thought to be an honest signal of the health condition of an individual in many bird species. For species that breed opportunistically, the quantity of food may be a determinant of singing activity. However, it is not yet known whether the quality of food plays an important role in this respect. The aim of...

The increase in size of human populations in urban and agricultural areas has resulted in considerable habitat conversion globally. Such anthropogenic areas have specific environmental characteristics, which influence the physiology, life history, and population dynamics of plants and animals. For example, the date of bud burst is advanced in urban...

Figure S1. Intensity of urbanisation according to (A) classification by scientists. Box plots show medians, quartiles, 5‐ and 95‐percentiles, and extreme values, and (B) CORINE land cover code (red = discontinuous urban, purple = industrial or commercial units, pink = green urban sites, brown = arable land and rice field, orange = agriculture lands...

Figure S2. Distribution of study plots across Europe, North Africa and the Middle East.

Table S1. Summary data for study plots. See Material and methods for definitions. Table S2. Correlation matrix of explanatory variables. Table S3. Mixed linear model investigating laying date in four passerines species (CF: Collared Flycatcher, GT: Great tit and PF: Pied Flycatcher) as a function of habitat characteristics (intensity of urbanisat...

Figure S3. Box plots of latitude of study plots in four passerine birds in Europe, North Africa and the Middle East.

The increase in size of human populations in urban and agricultural areas has resulted in considerable habitat conversion globally. Such anthropogenic areas have specific environmental characteristics, which influence the physiology, life history, and population dynamics of plants and animals. For example, the date of bud burst is advanced in urban...

Much research on animal communication has addressed how costs or constraints determined by the oxidative status of an individual can assure the honesty of visual signals, such as sexually selected color ornaments. However, acoustic communication has been largely overlooked in this respect. Here, we describe the few available studies that have consi...

Uitgangspunt van dit artikel is dat een kwaliteitsvolle lerarenopleiding gebaseerd is op twee evidenties, namelijk dat elke opleider zich primair identificeert als lerarenopleider (beroepsidentificatie) en dat het team van lerarenopleiders over voldoende autonomie beschikt om als zelfsturende leergemeenschap haar opdracht waar te maken (functionele...

Artificial lighting can alter individual behaviour, with often drastic and potentially negative effects on biological rhythms, daily activity and reproduction. Whether this is caused by a disruption of sleep, an important widespread behaviour enabling animals to recover from daily stress, is unclear. We tested the hypothesis that light pollution di...

Studies in several songbird species have shown that treating females with the androgenic steroid hormone testosterone (T) can negatively affect female reproductive behaviors and breeding success. As the effects of T on females appear to be species-specific, it is not clear if similar effects of high T occur in non-songbird species. Here, we studied...

The extended pace-of-life syndrome (POLS) hypothesis suggests that variation in boldness-like behaviors has co-evolved with variation in life-history strategies within populations, yet both theoretically driven experiments and evidence for phenotypic correlations between boldness-like behaviors and reproduction-related activities are scarce. Here w...

Eggshell blue-green colouration (BGC) is caused by the pigment biliverdin which has antioxidant capacities. Eggshell BGC has therefore been interpreted as being costly for the female and therefore a signal of female quality (‘sexual signalling hypothesis’). Southern rockhopper penguins Eudyptes chrysocome exhibit both a reversed hatching asynchrony...

Playback experiments are an important tool in behavioural studies and as a field technique for luring and catching individuals. While it is known that songbirds remember playback events on a short-term basis, resulting in decreased response after repeated stimulation, long-term behavioural responses to playbacks are unknown. By performing three sta...

It is well established that in many avian species, prenatal maternal resource allocation varies both between and within clutches and may affect offspring fitness. Differential allocation of maternal resources, in terms of egg weight and yolk composition, may therefore allow the female to adjust brood reduction and to fine-tune reproductive investme...

It is hypothesized that variation in immune function between individuals is due to costs incurred to sustain it. Support for this hypothesis mostly comes from short-term studies on the either costs of innate responses or a combination of innate and antibody responses. Key studies on the fitness and physiological costs of acquired immunity, in which...

Natuur- en milieueducatie voor duurzame ontwikkeling... Bij natuur- en milieueducatie of NME staan de relaties tussen natuur, milieu en maatschappij centraal. Een goede invalshoek om aan educatie voor duurzame ontwikkeling of EDO te werken. EDO leert 'denken over' en 'werken aan' een leefbare wereld, nu en in de toekomst, hier en elders op de plan...

Despite the appealing hypothesis that carotenoid-based colouration signals oxidative status, evidence supporting the antioxidant function of these pigments is scarce. Recent studies have shown that lutein, the most common carotenoid used by birds, can enhance the expression of non-visual traits, such as birdsong. Nevertheless, the underlying physio...

Summary information on studies of the relationship between clutch size and nest size in different species of birds.