Neuroecology studies ways in which the structure and function of the brain results from adaptations to a specific habitat and niche.Mars, R. B. & Bryant, K. L., Neuroecology: The brain in its world. In: Della Sala, S., (Ed.), Encyclopaedia of Behavioural Neuroscience (2nd Edition), pp. 757-765. Elsevier, 2021. . . .
It integrates the multiple disciplines of neuroscience, which examines the biological basis of cognitive and emotional processes, such as perception, memory, and decision-making,Kandel, E. R., Principles of neural science, Fifth Edition. McGraw-Hill Education, 2012. . . with the field of ecology, which studies the relationship between living organisms and their physical environment.Odum, E. P. & Barrett, G. W., Fundamentals of ecology. Brooks Cole, 2005. . .
In biology, the term 'adaptation' signifies the way evolutionary processes enhance an organism's fitness to survive within a specific ecological context. This fitness includes the development of physical, cognitive, and emotional adaptations specifically suited to the environmental conditions in which the organism or phenotype lives, and in which its species or genotype evolves.Dobzhansky, T., On some fundamental concepts of Darwinian biology. In Dobzhansky, T.; Hecht, M. K.; & Steere, W. C., (Eds.). Evolutionary Biology. Volume 2. Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1968. pp. 1–34. . .
Neuroecology concentrates specifically on neurological adaptations, particularly those of the brain. The purview of this study encompasses two areas. Firstly, neuroecology studies how the physical structure and functional activity of neural networks in a phenotype is influenced by characteristics of the environmental context. This includes the way social stressors, interpersonal relationships, and physical conditions precipitate persistent alterations in the individual brain, providing the neural correlates of cognitive and emotional responses. Secondly, neuroecology studies how neural structure and activity common to a genotype is determined by natural selection of traits that benefit survival and reproduction in a specific environment.Pickett, S. T., Kolasa, J., & Jones, C. G., Ecological understanding: the nature of theory and the theory of nature. Elsevier, 2010. . .Watanabe, S., Hofman, M. A., & Shimizu, T. (Eds.), Evolution of the brain, cognition, and emotion in vertebrates. Springer, 2017. . .
See also Evolutionary ecology Evolutionary psychology
References
External links Cognitive Neuroecology Lab at the FMRIB Centre of the University of Oxford (UK) and Donders Institute in Nijmegen (Netherlands)