Dataset: Consistent after all: Behavioural repeatability in a long-lived lizard across a 6-year field

This dataset contains the data used in Payne et al. (2021) Animal Behaviour. Consistent after all: Behavioural repeatability in a long-lived lizard across a 6-year field. In Payne et al. (2021), we studied animal personalities over an 8-year period, representing 6 study years, in a wild population of the long-lived sleepy lizard, Tiliqua rugosa. Using Bayesian generalized linear mixed models for 170 unique individuals and a total of 379 lizard-years, we 1) considered the effects of a suite of predictors – particularly lizard sex, mass, and tick counts – on lizard aggression and boldness; 2) assessed repeatability (i.e., consistent differences among individuals) of these behaviours over different time scales and between lizard sexes; and 3) evaluated the correlation, or behavioural syndrome, between aggression and boldness. We found that males were marginally more aggressive and bolder than females, mass had no significant effect, and tick loads exhibited a positive relationship with aggression and boldness. For repeatability, we found that even with the long timescales considered in this study, aggression and boldness were both repeatable – across the entire dataset (~0.4 and ~0.3, respectively), as well as among years (~0.4 and ~0.4, respectively). Repeatability did not differ substantially between the sexes. We found no syndrome between aggression and boldness. Our results are notable because they demonstrate that wild animals may exhibit consistent personality differences in ecologically-relevant behaviours over extended periods, even in the face of substantial temporal variation in ecological and social factors. The data provided here include the information required for our analyses. Briefly, sleepy lizards have a limited activity season, mainly August - December. During these seasons, we repeatedly captured lizards in our study site, assessing their ticks, mass, sex, and behaviour. The csv file (behavior_data.csv) in this dataset includes these variables (e.g., aggression and boldness scores, trial dates, tick counts, etc). For more details on our methodology and the study system, please see Payne et al. (2021) and citations therein. Please also see the meta file (meta.md) included with the dataset, which describes our variables in detail. The meta file is in markdown format, which can be opened in any text editor.本数据集包含Payne等人（2021）发表于《Animal Behaviour》（《动物行为学》）的研究所用数据，对应论文题为"Consistent after all: Behavioural repeatability in a long-lived lizard across a 6-year field"（《始终如一：6年野外追踪中长寿蜥蜴的行为重复性》）。在Payne等人（2021）的研究中，我们针对长寿的钝蓝舌蜥（Tiliqua rugosa，sleepy lizard）野生种群开展了为期8年的追踪调查，涵盖6个研究年度，以探究动物个性特征。本研究基于170个独立个体及总计379条蜥蜴年度样本，采用贝叶斯广义线性混合模型（Bayesian generalized linear mixed models）开展分析：1）探究一系列预测因子——尤其是蜥蜴性别、体重和蜱虫计数——对蜥蜴攻击性与大胆性的影响；2）评估这两种行为在不同时间尺度下以及不同性别蜥蜴间的重复性（即个体间的稳定差异）；3）分析攻击性与大胆性之间的相关性，即行为综合征（behavioural syndrome）。研究结果显示，雄性蜥蜴的攻击性与大胆性略高于雌性；体重对这两种行为无显著影响；而蜱虫负荷与攻击性、大胆性呈正相关关系。关于行为重复性，本研究发现即便考虑到较长的时间跨度，攻击性与大胆性仍均表现出显著重复性：在全数据集范围内，二者的重复性分别约为0.4和0.3；在年度间的分析中，二者重复性均约为0.4，且不同性别蜥蜴的行为重复性并无显著差异。本研究未发现攻击性与大胆性之间存在行为综合征。本研究结果具有重要意义，因为其证实了即便生态与社会因素存在显著的年度动态变化，野生动物仍可在与生态相关的行为上表现出长期稳定的个性差异。本数据集提供的内容包含本研究分析所需的全部信息。简言之，钝蓝舌蜥的活动季较为有限，主要为每年8月至12月。在该时段内，我们在研究区域内多次捕获蜥蜴，对其蜱虫感染情况、体重、性别以及行为进行记录评估。本数据集附带的CSV文件（behavior_data.csv）包含上述所有变量，例如攻击性与大胆性得分、试验日期、蜱虫计数等。若需了解研究方法与研究系统的更多细节，请参阅Payne等人（2021）的原文及其参考文献。此外，本数据集还附带元数据文件meta.md，其中详细说明了各变量的定义，该文件采用Markdown格式，可通过任意文本编辑器打开。