Exploring novelty: a component trait of behavioural syndromes in a colonial fish

Individual differences in exploratory behaviour have been shown to be consistent across contexts and suggested to be part of behavioural syndromes in a diversity of species, including fish. Explo-ration has also been shown to be a key factor in understanding complex ecological processes such as sexual selection and cooperation. Another important question in ecology is why animals breed in colonies. Exploration syndromes, by affecting prospecting behaviour, dispersal and public infor-mation use may also contribute to our understanding of coloniality. This study aims at investigating whether an exploration syndrome exists in a colonial fish species, Neolamprologus caudopuncta-tus. Individuals of this species were subjected to two consecutive tests, a novel environment and a novel object test. Results show that more explorative individuals in a novel environment are also less neophobic in the presence of a novel object, suggesting that the tendency to engage with nov-elty per se is a consistent trait and part of an exploration syndrome. These results are discussed in light of the contribution of an exploration syndrome to explain colony formation in animals