Question

Explain how vasopressin, and the gene avpr1a, is involved in variation in sociality in prairie voles.

Answer 1

Prairie voles are the socially monogamous rodents, i.e., they exhibit preferences for social familiar partners during extended choice tests. They exhibit human like social behavior and lives in social colonies.

The prairie vole maintain the pair bonding. The male has continuous contact with its female counterpart, This lasts for the end of their lives.

Pair-bonding is a critical factor in the evolutionary development of a social brain. The brain neuropeptide arginine vasopressin or AVP influences the pair-bonding behavior in voles.

In the male prairie vole the gene for the vasopressin receptor has a longer segment. It is similar like humans. all the animals that exhibit human like social behavior and pair bonding do have the same condition.

The gene that codes for the "vasopressin 1 a" is responsible or regulator of the complex behavior of the prarie voles or humans. hence the variation in this gene is responsible for the change in the vasopressin content, and which in turn is responsible for the variation in sociality in prarie voles.