Banca de DEFESA: BARBARA BARROS AZEVEDO DE ALBUQUERQUE

Uma banca de DEFESA de MESTRADO foi cadastrada pelo programa.
STUDENT : BARBARA BARROS AZEVEDO DE ALBUQUERQUE
DATE: 17/07/2026
TIME: 14:30
LOCAL: Videoconferência
TITLE:

Body Coloration and Population Recognition in Mate Choice by Males of Leptuca leptodactyla (Crustacea, Ocypodidae)

KEY WORDS:

Reproductive behavior; courtship strategies; Ocypodidae; Color polymorphism; Visual signaling.

PAGES: 52
BIG AREA: Ciências Humanas
AREA: Psicologia
SUMMARY:

Coloration is an important component of visual communication and plays different roles in animals, particularly in the context of sexual selection. Because different environments impose distinct selective pressures on visual signals, they may lead to the emergence of different phenotypes among populations, potentially influencing mate recognition. Fiddler crabs are known for their diverse color patterns and for the hypertrophied major claw used in mate attraction. Although female mate choice has been extensively studied, recent evidence suggests that males may also exhibit selectivity. Therefore, we investigated whether male courtship behavior is influenced by female coloration and whether males can identify and preferentially select females from their own population over females from another population. We used two populations belonging to the same watershed, assessed colorimetric differences between them, and compared male responses to light and dark females from their own population, as well as to females from either their own or a foreign population. Our results showed that the populations differed in objective luminance and in individual-substrate contrast. However, males exhibited no preference for either light or dark females, nor for females from their own population. A population-specific pattern was observed only for physical contact behavior, with males from the Aquaculture Technology Center of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN) interacting more frequently with females from their own population. Furthermore, males from this population displayed higher overall behavioral activity than males from Barra do Rio. Taken together, these results indicate that coloration differences between populations were not sufficient to drive male mate choice.

COMMITTEE MEMBERS:
Interno - 1149552 - ARRILTON ARAUJO DE SOUZA
Presidente - 1476621 - DANIEL MARQUES DE ALMEIDA PESSOA
Externa à Instituição - SOFIA CORADINI SCHIRMER - UnB