Personality variation in a marine snail and heterogeneous selection in natural populations

Personality variation is characterized by consistent differences in behavioral tendencies among individuals and is a common feature of animal populations. However, processes influencing the amount of personality variation are not well understood. In this study, we tested one hypothesized mechanism through which variation in personalities may be maintained: spatial variation in natural selection. Through laboratory behavioral assays, we demonstrated that two aspects of personality, exploration and boldness, are moderately repeatable for wavy turban snails, Megastrea undosa (mean repeatability values = 0.327 and 0.281, respectively). We also found that personality variation differed significantly among populations, with behavioral repeatability values differing by factors of up to 1.75X for the same personality trait in different populations. We next examined the fitness consequences of variation in personality traits by experimentally transporting assayed snails to natural populations in..., , # Data from: Personality variation in a marine snail and heterogeneous selection in natural populations

Dataset DOI: [10.5061/dryad.3ffbg79zk](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.3ffbg79zk)

Author contact: [[e-mail]](mailto:[e-mail])

## Description of the data and file structure

These data come from a mark-recapture study of wavy turban snails in Southern California, USA. Field studies took place between June 2022 and March 2024. Snails were subject to repeated behavioral assays in the laboratory in order to measure repeatability of exploration and risk-taking behaviors. The same snails were tagged and released into the field to measure growth and survival over a ~6-month period.

In all of the data files, an entry of \"NA\" indicates that data were not available. In most cases, this was because a subset of measurements was not taken. For example, a few snails in the mark-recapture study had not been assayed for all behaviors. 

Similarly, in the data files s...,