User:Livkelly18/sandbox

Article Evaluation
The article I evaluated was titled Dog Behaviour.

This is fairly general about many types of dog behaviour. It discusses the evolution of dog behaviour and how/if it coincided with human behaviour as well as discussing various forms of canine behaviour such as playfulness and tail chasing. It also mentions the differences in socialization between wild canines and domestic ones and what these behaviours could be interpreted as. The article mentions two major theories up for debate on how dogs became domesticated and both theories are argued within the article, there just appears to be more information arguing one side more so than the other. The author appears to be more focussed on how dogs became domesticated through human interaction rather than on their own, so there is a subtle bias. However, this article also touches on reproductive behaviour and even has a small section on dog attacks.

A critique I have of this article is on its lack of citations. Although the author of the article mentions the main article they used at the beginning of each paragraph, there still needs to be more citations throughout each paragraph because the information being used is not their own. There is also a lot of theorizing happening within the article. For instance, within the article the sentence "this could imply.." "presumably allowing.." under the heading Social Behaviour is used. These are assumptions said within the article after a point has been made previously.

This article also gives human like characteristics to dogs which I believe to be sort of informal in this context. A different word choice would be more appropriate.

Under the category Empathy within the article, the user mentions a study where a third of dogs experienced separation anxiety when separated from others, thus trying to prove that dogs do experience empathy, however, they do no elaborate on this study, they cited it and kind of left the sentence in midair. Are the "others" being mentioned people or dogs?

The reference section of this article is thorough, and the links to the sources do work so if something is cited there is no issue trying to find where the information came from.

Within the Talk section of this article, the main focus of conversation appears to be missing behaviours within the article which ultimately resulted in the original author going back through their work and expanding on it. Other than that, there is very little discussion there. This article, however, is written within the WikiProject Dogs. It has also been ranked Start Class meaning that the information within the article may or may not contain reliable sources, so it needs improving. It has also been ranked as "High Importance" on the importance scale.

Link to the article:

Dog behavior

Possible Citation use for editing article Nuptial gift
The following articles could help improve the Wiki page Nuptial Gift. There is still much to learn and explore about nuptial gift giving; its purpose, benefits and downsides. I would like to more closely examine the effects nuptial gift giving has on females.

Albo, M., Winther, G., Tuni, C., Toft, S., & Bilde, T. (2011). Worthless donations: male deception and female counter play in a nuptial gift-giving spider. BMC Evolutionary Biology, 11(1), 329. doi: 10.1186/1471-2148-11-329

Fricke, C., Perry, J., Chapman, T., & Rowe, L. (2009). The conditional economics of sexual conflict. Biology Letters, 5(5), 671-674. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2009.043

LeBas, N. R., & Hockham, L. R. (2005). An invasion of cheats: the evolution of worthless nuptial gifts. Current Biology, 15(1), 64-67.

Lewis SM, Vahed K, Koene JM, Engqvist L, Bussie`re LF, Perry JC, Gwynne D, Lehmann GUC. 2014 Emerging issues in the evolution of animal nuptial gifts. Biol. Lett. 10: 20140336. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2014.0336

Toft, S., & Albo, M. (2016). The shield effect: nuptial gifts protect males against pre-copulatory sexual cannibalism. Biology Letters, 12(5), 20151082. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2015.1082

Voigt, C., Kretzschmar, A., Speakman, J., & Lehmann, G. (2008). Female bushcrickets fuel their metabolism with male nuptial gifts. Biology Letters, 4(5), 476-478. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2008.0282

= Article Draft =

Defining Nuptial Gift
A nuptial gift is often referred to as a token that is presented to a female by a male in order to copulate. This definition, however, is not wrong, but not completely correct. Nuptial gifting is at the intersection of sexual selection, nutritional ecology and life history theory, creating a link between the three. Nuptial gifts are both widespread and diverse. A more accurate definition of a nuptial gift would be a material presentation to a recipient by a donor that is not simply the gametes in order to improve the fitness of the donor. This definition insinuates neutral gifts, costly gifts and beneficial gifts regarding the fitness of the recipient. It also encompasses hermaphrodite nuptial gift exchange where the gift giving is often bidirectional as well as encompassing female to male gift giving.

Nuptial gifts vary but can mostly be explained within two main dimensions :

Dimension 1: How gifts are taken by recipients
There are three ways in which a gift may be received. The first being an oral gift, which is absorbed through the digestive system of the recipient. The second is genital gifts; the gift is absorbed through the reproductive tract. Lastly, there are transdermal gifts which are injected into the body wall of the recipient by the donor.

Dimension 2: Gifting based on source
There are two types of gifts; endogenous gifts and exogenous gifts.

Endogenous gifts are those that are made by the donor. These gifts often carry great cost to the donor and usually contain hemolymph or body parts. For instance, endogenous oral gifts are secreted by the donors glands (salivary, reproductive, etc). They often carry nutrients that are severally lacking in the body of the recipient, these include types of macro nutrients, micro nutrients, water and defensive chemicals. A study was done on the moth Utetheisa ornatrix, where the male gifted the female with defensive alkaloids in order to reduce predation of the larvae and eggs of the female, an excellent example of defensive chemicals. Not only are some of the gifts that are presented to females not nutritionally based, but they can actually affect the fitness of the recipient. For instance, in some hermaphroditic land snails, one partner (the donor) shoots a mucus covered dart at the other called a love dart (the recipient). This ultimately increases the fitness of the donor but at a great risk to the recipient. This dart changes the sperm storage ability of the receiver, not to mention the risk of injury from the dart itself. If shot in the incorrect place, the dart could puncture vital organs of the receiver resulting in permanent reproductive ability damage or death.

Exogenous gifts are food items that the donor would capture or collect in order to present to the recipient. These can include seeds, prey items and leaves but can also include non-nutritive things as well like rocks. Gifts such as these increase the chances of the donors mating success and the duration of copulation.

Role Reversal
A popular and more occurring area of study is the male presenting the nuptial gift to the female, however, the reverse does occur. Female Zeus bugs, Phoreticovelia disparata, actually present the male with a food item before copulation. After the food item is presented to the male, he will ride on the back of the female in a small hallow. As he rides on her back she secretes a wax from a gland on the back of her head. The male will ride on the back of the female for up to a week, eating the wax feed she secretes; she is able to secrete this wax until the male decides to leave. Once the sperm is finally deposited, it will allow the female to lay fertile eggs for up to two weeks. At first, it appeared that there were no obvious advantages to the female in this scenario, upon closer inspection scientists believe that by allowing the male to remain, it is energetically efficient for the female. She saves energy. She does not have to fight off the male, or any other male that attempts to copulate with her, she is guaranteed the ability to reproduce, it also greatly reduces the risk of harming herself in combat.

Benefits to the female
Nuptial gift giving is often described in such a way that it only really affects the male counterpart. Nuptial gifting is also of benefit to the female. It has been shown that female fireflies will route spermatophore (contain sperm and are produced by the accessory gland) nutrients throughout their body from a few hours up to a few days. One major benefit of this is that the female now does not have to hunt or graze as frequently, limiting her exposure to predation. Females also have the ability to direct the nutrition from the nuptial gift to the part of the body that needs it the most. Often times it is directed towards metabolism. This can be seen within female Bushcrickets. An experiment was conducted whereby there were two groups of males, one group was fed with high levels of 13C the other with low levels. These males then presented their gifts to the females and the isotopic changes in exhaled breath of the females were measured after consumption. Within 3 hours, the stable carbon isotope ratio of the breath was the same as the ratio of male donors gift, proving that the female had directed the extra nutrients to metabolism.

References:
1. Rooney, J., Lewis, S. 2002. Fitness advantage of nuptial gifts in female fireflies. Ecological Entomology, 27(3), 373-377. doi: 10.1046/j.1365-2311.2002.00420

2. Albo, M., Winther, G., Tuni, C., Toft, S., & Bilde, T. 2011. Worthless donations: male deception and female counter play in a nuptial gift-giving spider. BMC Evolutionary Biology, 11(1), 329. doi: 10.1186/1471-2148-11-329

3. Fricke, C., Perry, J., Chapman, T., & Rowe, L. 2009. The conditional economics of sexual conflict. Biology Letters, 5(5), 671-674. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2009.043

4. LeBas, N. R., & Hockham, L. R. 2005. An invasion of cheats: the evolution of worthless nuptial gifts. Current Biology, 15(1), 64-67.

5. Lewis SM, Vahed K, Koene JM, Engqvist L, Bussie`re LF, Perry JC, Gwynne D, Lehmann GUC. 2014 Emerging issues in the evolution of animal nuptial gifts. Biol. Lett. 10: 20140336. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2014.0336

6. Toft, S., & Albo, M. 2016. The shield effect: nuptial gifts protect males against pre-copulatory sexual cannibalism. Biology Letters, 12(5), 20151082. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2015.1082

7. Voigt, C., Kretzschmar, A., Speakman, J., & Lehmann, G. 2008. Female bushcrickets fuel their metabolism with male nuptial gifts. Biology Letters, 4(5), 476-478. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2008.0282

New added references

8. Eisner T, Meinwald J. 1995 The chemistry of sexual selection. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 92, 50 – 55. doi:10.1073/pnas.92.1.50

9. Koene JM, Schulenburg H. 2005 Shooting darts: co- evolution and counter-adaptation in hermaphroditic snails. BMC Evol. Biol. 5, 25. doi:10.1186/1471- 2148-5-25

10. Lewis SM, South A. 2012 The evolution of animal nuptial gifts. Adv. Behav. 44, 53 – 97. (doi:10.1016/ B978-0-12-394288-3.00002-2)

11. Arnqvist G, Jones TM, Elgar MA. 2003 Reversal of sex roles in nuptial feeding. Nature 424, 387. doi:10.1038/424387a

Peer Review by Munstudent22:
This is a very interesting topic! You did a great job of organizing your information! There are a few edits that I would suggest:


 * 1) There is no lead section. I think that one of the assignment outlines specifies what should be included in a lead section. I believe it is a critical part of a wikipedia article.
 * 2) There are a few instances in which you give a fact but don't include an associated citation:
 * 3) in defining section: often referred to as… should have a citation attached
 * 4) under benefits section: I would include a citation for the second sentence
 * 5) under dimension 1: I would add a citation for each of the three ways
 * 6) Your citations don't link to your references section (see the assignment section for references for detailed instructions on how to do this)
 * 7) I would add links to each species you mention, I would also link to “macronutrients” and “micronutrients” and fix the spellings. Additionally, I would link to spermatophore, and any other more technical term that people may not understand.
 * 8) For example, what is 13C? In my opinion, the last section gets a bit technical and it becomes a little hard to follow. I would consider rewording this section to make it easier for the average person to follow.
 * 9) Using the phrase “more accurate” displays bias. I would try to make the article neutral, as recommended in the assignment guidelines, and wikipedia guidelines in general.
 * 10) Throughout the article, there are a lot of run-on sentences, with lots of commas. I think that a lot of the concepts would be easier to follow if the sentences were broken up into core ideas.
 * 11) Furthermore, I think that in a lot of the sentences an oxford comma would help to communicate the ideas in a less potentially confusing manner
 * 12) ex. …ecology, and life history…
 * 13) I think adding photos would increase the quality of your article!

I think the most important change would be the addition of a lead section. Overall, you did a great job organizing your ideas, and I think you did a great job focussing on important aspects of your topic. You also seem to have chosen strong references!

Once again, a lot of these potential edits reflect my personal opinion. Let me know if you have any questions or need any clarifications on what I’m trying to say.

Great job!

Peer Review from k36jew
Your article is well written and quite interesting. It really explains what nuptial gifts are and I learned more about them from reading your article.

A few suggestions that I can make for your article are:

(1) Some species examples for the three ways gifts are received in the dimension 1 section would help strengthen the section. Also, adding citation for where you found the information for the three ways would help strength the article.

(2) You discuss the benefits and costs of nuptial gift giving/receiving for females in great detail and it may help round out the article if you discussed some of the male benefits and/or costs for giving/receiving nuptial gifts.

(3) Adding some links to other Wikipedia articles would also help round out the article. As an example, adding a wiki-link to the article for Utetheisa ornatrix, would provide information about the species for people that do not know what it is and strengthen your article.

(4) A final suggestion would be to consider adding a few images of the types of nuptial gifts given by different species. This would bring an extra element to the article to help round it out.

Overall, the article is neutral in tone, and has some great sources. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it and I hope these suggestions help.

Good job!