Studies show that female fish are more likely to mate with a male they’ve encountered before, a response that stems from a neuron signal whence in the presence of familiar males. Japanese scientists studied the nervous systems of female Medaka fish as they were introduced to males, in order to understand more thoroughly the neural behavior of social decision-making. The results showed that females were quicker to mate with males they already knew rather than strangers. The reason could be that the neuron called TN-GnRH3 became active at this time. This phenomena itself may be unique to the fish, but social familiarity is believed to influence the mating decisions of many other species of animals. However, neural activity that accompanies such decisions may not be completely known. Although they are considered to be the most primitive vertebrate, fish do indeed have a social brain and studying their neural activity could help humans better understand their own social decision making in the process.
Image: en.wikipedia.org
