Our research focuses on the relationship between genetics and early environments in the development of behavior patterns and sensory processes. We concentrate on natricine snakes and constricting snakes as models, and feeding, defensive, and social behavior as the target systems. Comparing molecular genetics, behavior, and morphology across populations, especially island systems, is frequently employed. Vomeronasal chemoreception, highly elaborated in snakes, is the sensory system typically studied. We have found that neonatal snakes are highly precocious in both the sensory and behavioral sophistication of their responses prior to functional experience. However, we can manipulate experience to uncover details of ecological and comparative adaptation, including geographic variation. We are also studying multiple paternity, heritability of learning, and brain imaging in snakes. The role of environmental enrichment on brain and behavior in reptiles is being studied. Finally, play is a key characteristic of endothermic vertebrates that may underlie the success of our species. We have developed and are testing a theoretical and comparative approach to play behavior throughout the vertebrates.
Books
The Genesis of Animal Play: Testing the Limits (2005)
In The Genesis of Animal Play, Gordon Burghardt examines the origins and evolution of play...
The Cognitive Animal: Empirical and Theoretical Perspectives on Animal Cognition (with Allen M. Bekoff) (2002)
The fifty-seven original essays in this book provide a comprehensive overview of the interdisciplinary field...
The Well-being of Animals in Zoo and Aquarium Sponsored Research (with J. T. Bielitski, J. R. Boyce, and D. O. Schaefer) (1996)
Covers how research concerns different in zoos and aquariums, ethical considerations for conservation research, trends...
Iguanas of the World: Their Behavior, Ecology, and Conservation (with Stanley Rand) (1982)
Iguanas are large, primeval-appearing animals that have always attracted considerable attention and scientific study. The...
Articles
Breaking the social-nonsocial dichotomy: A role for reptiles in vertebrate social behaviour research? (with J. Sean Doody and Vladimir Dinets), Ethology (2013)
Although social behavior in vertebrates spans a continuum from solitary to highly social, taxa are...
Prey availability influences the ontogeny and timing of chemoreception-based prey shifting in the striped crayfish snake, Regina alleni (with R. M. Waters), Journal of Comparative Psychology (2013)
Striped crayfish snakes (Regina alleni) undergo a dietary shift from dragonfly larvae to crayfish during...
Chemical investigations of defensive steroid sequestration by the Asian snake Rhabdophis tigrinus (with Deborah A. Hutchinson, Alan H. Savitzky, Jerrold Meinwald, and Frank C. Schroeder), Chemoecology (2012)
Rhabdophis tigrinus is an Asian natricine snake that possesses unusual defensive glands on the dorsal...
Nuchal glands: a novel defensive system in snakes (with Akira Mori, Alan H. Savitzky, Kathleen A. Roberts, Deborah A. Hutchinson, and Richard C. Goris), Chemoecology (2012)
Of the various chemical defensive adaptations of vertebrates, nuchal glands are among the most unusual....
Sequestered defensive toxins in tetrapod vertebrates: principles, patterns, and prospects for future studies (with Alan H. Savitzky, Akira Mori, Deborah A. Hutchinson, Ralph A. Saporito, Harvey B. Lillywhite, and Jerrold Meinwald), Chemoecology (2012)
Chemical defenses are widespread among animals, and the compounds involved may be either synthesized from...
Contributions to Books
Consummatory acts, The Encyclopedia of Applied Animal Behaviour and Welfare (2010)
The practical focus of this authoritative, comprehensive encyclopedia promotes the understanding and improvement of animal...
Reptiles, The Encyclopedia of Applied Animal Behaviour and Welfare (2010)
The practical focus of this authoritative, comprehensive encyclopedia promotes the understanding and improvement of animal...