Schooling Behavior of Stickleback Fish from Different Habitats

This activity guides the analysis of a published scientific figure from a study that tested how individual fish responded to an artificial model of a fish school. 

Schooling is a social behavior that differs among threespine stickleback fish in different habitats. To test whether schooling behavior is inherited or learned, individual stickleback fish were raised without their parents and then placed near an artificial model of a school. Panel A of the figure shows the design for the model, which consisted of eight model fish attached to a rotating wheel. Panel B shows the average time that individual marine or freshwater stickleback fish spent schooling with the model. The “Educator Materials” document includes a captioned figure, background information, graph interpretation, and discussion questions. The “Student Handout” includes a captioned figure and background information.

The “Resource Google Folder” link directs to a Google Drive folder of resource documents in the Google Docs format. Not all downloadable documents for the resource may be available in this format. The Google Drive folder is set as “View Only”; to save a copy of a document in this folder to your Google Drive, open that document, then select File → “Make a copy.” These documents can be copied, modified, and distributed online following the Terms of Use listed in the “Details” section below, including crediting BioInteractive.

The video below shows the experiment in action.