a'tris

A week or so ago, I stumbled across a video of some finches ‘playing’ electric guitars and shared it here for, as Nate would say, ‘funsies.’ The post got some great comments and a lot of hits across our social networks so I thought I’d throw some more bird-related goodness your way. Why not?

My co-writer, Michael Kreher, passed this article, What do Great Tits Reveal about the Genetics of Personality? by blogger GrrlScientist along to me recently and I thought it was a pretty fascinating read. I’ve included an excerpt from the beginning below, you can read the rest here, or just enjoy the title as your moment of Zen

Research suggests that personality variations are heritable in humans and other animal species, and there are many hypotheses as to why differences in personality exist and are maintained. One approach for investigating the heritability of personality lies in identifying which genes underlie specific personality traits so scientists can then determine how the frequencies of specific variants of personality-related genes change in both space and time as well as in relation to changing environmental influences.

For example, in humans, the best-studied “personality gene” is the dopamine receptor D4 (DRD4) gene, which is involved in motivation, pleasure, cognition, memory, and learning. The DRD4 gene encodes a receptor protein that binds to the neurotransmitter, dopamine. When DRD4 binds dopamine, this interaction influences novelty seeking and exploratory behavior in a range of species, including humans and birds.

Continued here

Hope this finds you feeling healthy!

-Mason