Talk:Animal sexual behaviour

Template:WAP assignment

Moles

In the section on moles, it states

"It has also been recorded that certain species of mole will 'rape' new borns of their own species, the biological advantage to this is that when those moles mature and become fertile, they will become pregnant with the sperm of the mole that had mated with them at a very young age."

The problem i see is that can the sperm survive inside the newborns for long enough to them to mature? I am by no means an expert on the subject, and found nothing at a quick glance on the cycle of maturation on moles, but to the best of my knowledge seminal fluid can only sustain the sperm inside the female body for 40 or so hours. That of course as a result of the natural reaction of the female body to destroy the semen immediatly after it enters the vaginal cavity.

As I said, i am no expert on the subject, so I may be far off here, I'm not going to touch it, I'll let someone who knows what they are doing do that, but I felt the need to point this out.

cross species behaviour by dolphins

Dolphins have engaged in cross species sexual foreplay with humans

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j75KdkV7n2o

http://www.salon.com/2014/06/14/human_on_dolphin_sex_is_not_really_that_weird/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/06/frisky-dolphin-tries-to-get-busy-divers_n_1862148.html

http://justingregg.com/the-dolphin-rape-myth/

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Dolphin#Social_behavior

Perhaps a NPOV mention should be made of this.

--108.18.178.166 (talk) 23:39, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

This information should be included in Animal sexual behavior#Cross species sex. Jarble (talk) 05:54, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/ appears to be a mirror of Wikipedia, so I have removed it from this list. Jarble (talk) 22:18, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Abnormal animal sexual behaviour

This article has become filled with quotes, anecdotes and case studies of abnormal sexual behaviour in animals. This is seriously compromising the respectability of this article which should have a much greater emphasis on normal sexual behaviour. For example, there are countless mentions of incidences of homosexuality, necrophilia, fetishes, etc!. For goodness sake! There is an entire article called Homosexual behavior in animals. The examples in this article will be moved there or deleted so that the focus can be on a much more encyclopaedic and representative presentation of (normal) animal sexual behaviour. Other examples include inter-specific matings. These should be in a separate article Interspecific mating in animals or at the very least, if it is to remain in this article, it should be under a sub-heading "Abnormal" rather than being given undue weight leading the naive reader to think this is normal behaviour.__DrChrissy (talk) 22:17, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

DrChrissy, homosexual behavior in non-human animals is not necessarily abnormal, as is made clear in the Homosexual behavior in animals article. Furthermore, moving any homosexual content from this article to that article would be redundant, since that article already covers all of the content mentioned in this one. This article should have a decent amount of homosexuality content, and that content should be presented in a WP:Summary style manner, pointing people to the Homosexual behavior in animals article for in-depth material. The other content should also be well-presented in this article, with a link pointing to the main articles for those topics if they have main articles. We do not need a separate article for all of this content. We should ideally only create WP:Spinouts when needed. And before creating a WP:Spinout, you should see if the matter can be adequately covered in an existing article (for example, by creating an "Other animals" section) or if there is an article specifically about the topic among non-human animals. Flyer22 (talk) 22:51, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

This depends on the definition of what is "normal" and what is not (i.e. "abnormal"). I prefer to use an objective, statistical approach with knowledge of the species ethogram, rather than relying on undue weight on anecdotes etc. As you have said, moving any homosexual content from this article to Homosexual behavior in animals would be redundant because it is already there. Therefore, that makes this information redundant on this article. I agree, a summary section is needed on this article with a

Main article: [[:Homosexual behavior in animals]]

included.__DrChrissy (talk) 23:05, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

Yes, it depends on what one's definitions of normal and abnormal are. I also see that you added an Abnormal behaviour section to the article. But just so we're clear, I made the above statement based on my knowledge of non-human animal sexual behavior, what WP:Reliable sources state on the matter, and how we should go about Wikipedia policies and guidelines. As for WP:Undue weight, my user page is clear that I don't engage in it. Anyway, going back to what is abnormal, scientists of today are clear that non-human animal sexual behavior is not as "normal" as scientists of the past once thought it to be. What is in this article about homosexuality is not necessarily redundant to what is in the Homosexual behavior in animals article. The same goes for other topics in the article that you would perhaps categorize as abnormal non-human animal sexual behavior. Of course, in the case of the topics that have Wikipedia articles, there is going to be some redundancy...since these aspects, per WP:Summary style (and per common knowledge on creating a comprehensive article), should be addressed in this article. Flyer22 (talk) 23:38, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

I'd prefer that no information be deleted completely. We have another article about non-reproductive behavior called Animal co-opted sexual behavior, so certain details could be merged there if necessary (though I'm fine with the current state). Since that title is not very intuitive, it could be moved to Non-reproductive sexual behavior in animals. Also, this looks like WP:SYNTH. KateWishing (talk) 23:49, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

How can this possibly be WP:SYNTH! I quote numbers. I do not use any words such as "only" or "a small minority". I simply quote the number of total species of animals for the reader to form their own conclusions. Please don't worry about deletions of information from this article. Flyer22 has already reassured us above that all information is contained in another article which clearly makes detailed discussion on here, redundant.__DrChrissy (talk) 00:22, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Why mention the total number of species if not to imply some conclusion about the prevalence of homosexual behavior? The original source uses the 1500 figure to suggest that homosexual behavior is common, but you have presented it in a way that implies it's rare. It's misleading because the sexual behavior of most species has not been described at all.

Apart from homosexual behavior, there's also masturbation, oral sex, interspecies sex, necrophilia, fetishism, erotica, and sex with juveniles. This information is notable and should be preserved either here or somewhere else. KateWishing (talk) 01:10, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Two comments. I think DrChrissy is right to be concerned about the article losing balance with an over-emphasis on non-procreative sexual behaviours. Surely the core business of sexual behaviour is to do with the continuation of the species, and the article should not be unduly manipulated by editors pushing other issues. On the other hand, non-procreative sexual behaviours should receive due acknowledgement, and given their fair due. Such behaviours are not uncommon amongst animals, including humans, and there are probably sound evolutionary reasons for many of them. Sexuality is a very sensitive area for humans. In the context of this particular article, I do not agree at all with the use of the term "abnormal behaviour". The term, if it is to be used at all (I think it should not), should always be qualified as "statistically abnormal behaviour". Or better, "statistically uncommon behaviour". Otherwise the article is in danger of tipping to the other extreme, implying the sexually "moral" censoriousness which has caused so much unjustifiable distress to so many people. --Epipelagic (talk) 05:16, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

(talk page stalker)I'm not going to delve very far into this topic, but in passing, I will note that I see some consensus here, perhaps more than the editors involved realize. DrChrissy is right that statistics and the most reliable sources need to be used. Flyer22 is right to point out that we need to not avoid or downplay legitimate topics and that there are articles that cover the details in depth that should be linked. Epipelagic summarizes it well; there is a need for appropriate balance and to avoid use of potentially perjorative adjectives like "abnormal." It is true that we are not as certain of what "normal" behavior is as we might like (it is, for example, pretty common, for dogs to hump on inappropriate objects, to the point the behavior cannot be called "rare"). So we do need to acknowledge that some sources may have inadvertently inserted their own human emotion into some studies of behavior. Stick with statistics and good sources, cross-link to other appropriate articles freely and visibly, being sure that if material is cut here solely due to UNDUE weight issues, that it be placed into other appropriate articles. I'm willing to lurk here and comment as a more or less neutral party on the issue if asked, but at any rate, good luck all. Montanabw^(talk) 05:40, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Any input on these changes? It seems misleading to frame a source that says "Homosexuality is quite common in the animal kingdom" and "No species has been found in which homosexual behaviour has not been shown to exist, with the exception of species that never have sex at all" with original material that implies it's very rare (0.004%). Without a reliable source connecting these two statistics, it's WP:SYNTH. KateWishing (talk) 13:37, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

The reliable source is called a calculator! Why would there need to be a reliable source connecting two statistics to avoid WP:SYNTH? Wikipedia is absloutely full of sentences such as "researcher Jones stated there were XX, however, researcher Smith stated there were zz". There may not be any connecting source, but there is no WP:SYNTH, rather, this is presenting a balanced statement. The sentence that 1,500 species have been reported as performing homosexual behaviour is linked to a single source(the quality of which is under question by another editor) which states this number makes it "common". Leaving this without a balanced redress, or trying to remove the material is itself WP:SYNTH. Furthermore, just because one individual of a species has been reported as homosexual does not mean the entire species is homosexual. Just for the record, I am not against the reporting of homosexual behaviour in this article. I am a professional ethologist who has worked with animals for almost 30 years. I have seen several instances of homosexual behaviour, so not to report it would be against my own observations. All I am trying to do is give the reader a balanced account of the incidence of the behaviour.

The sentence in the article "No species has been found in which homosexual behaviour has not been shown to exist, with the exception of species that never have sex at all" is clearly undefendable and should be deleted or at least challenged. For this to mean anything, there would have to have been behavioural studies on all the 1,305,250 animal species that exist. I have my doubts this has happened.__DrChrissy (talk) 15:10, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Follow up. The same source states in the preceding sentence "Indeed, there is a number of animals in which homosexual behaviour has never been observed, such as many insects, passerine birds and small mammals." This is a direct contradiction! The reliability of this source really should be discussed.__DrChrissy (talk) 15:40, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

The problem is that the 0.004% statistic does not, in fact, offer any indication of the prevalence of homosexual behavior, because the sexual behavior of most species has not been studied at all. It would be just as meaningful to say that heterosexual behavior has only been recorded in 0.008% of animals. I'm fine with the article saying that homosexual behavior is rare, so long as that's the actual conclusion of a reliable source and not your own synthesis of two unrelated statistics. (By the way, 1,305,250 is the estimate of invertebrate species; including vertebrates, the total is 1,367,555.) KateWishing (talk) 16:04, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

I take your point. I have made edits which I hope represent this. Thanks for the heads up about the vertebrate/invertebrate numbers.__DrChrissy (talk) 17:12, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

@Epipelagic. Thanks for reminding me that I tend to be overly scientific/statistical in my use of "abnormal". I think your suggestion of "statistically uncommon behaviour" is a very good one.__DrChrissy (talk) 15:16, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

• When the RS is a calculator, the raw number is not WP:SYNTH, but a statement of rare/common or abnormal/normal is WP:SYNTH absent a RS explaining that it is and why. Here, I'd be most comfortable just plugging the number and letting the reader decide the significance of the evidence for themselves. To some, that it exists at all is "proof of normal" while for others, the low prevalence is "proof" the opposite direction. I think NPOV says we just teach the controversy and let the reader derive their own conclusions. Montanabw^(talk) 23:48, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

The reference to the total known number of species (with specious 7 figure accuracy!) statistically illustrates nothing and should be removed. Homosexual behaviour is mainly studied in vertebrates, about 60,000 species (over half of them fish), and even more particularly in mammals, about 5,400 species. And even those figures mean little unless we know how many of the species have been specifically studied for such behaviour. As to whether the interview with Petter Bøckman is a reliable source, I have pinged him since he edits Wikipedia and might like to contribute to this discussion himself. Peter has made many useful contributions to articles related to evolution both here and on the Norwegian Wikipedia. He was an organiser of Against Nature?, the exhibition on homosexuality in animals held at the Norwegian Natural History Museum. --Epipelagic (talk) 09:40, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

@ Epipelagic: Thanks very much for your input on this and for contactingg Petter Bockman. It is worth us all remembering that this figure of 1,500 is not a quote, and is therefore perhaps not directly attributable to Bockman. It also strikes me that "1,500" is an unusually "round" number and therefore as specious as the 7 figure accuracy of the total number of species. I think we are caught up in the WP problem of verifiability before truth!__DrChrissy (talk) 15:12, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Hi, sorry to be late to the party (and thanks for the invite).

Just to clear up some sources: The number 1500 is from Bruce Bagemihl's "Biological exuberance", 1999. He lists a number of studies where animals are engaged in sexual or sexuality-related behaviour towards same sex conspecifics (and sometimes across species, like in the Brown-headed cowbird), and simply summarized the number of species. Since the species identity is uncertain in some cases and what constitutes a species or not is sometimes in doubt, Bagemihl gave a round number. He should be the source for the number, not me.

The quote from me (from an interview in connection with the Against Nature? exhibition) must be seen against the notion discussed in the article that homosexual behaviour is somehow an extraordinary phenomenon. We know very little about the behaviour of many animals, sexual or otherwise. The majority of known speices are small insects, for many we don't even know what eat, let alone how they conduct their social business. The quote is to warn against assuming all sexual behaviour naturally conforms to our social narratives.

The quote is mangled above. Here's the full quote:

"To turn the approach on its head: No species has been found in which homosexual behaviour has not been shown to exist, with the exception of species that never have sex at all, such as sea urchins and aphis (aphids are meant as facultatively asexual reproducers). Moreover, a part of the animal kingdom is hermaphroditic, truly bisexual. For them, homosexuality is not an issue."

The term "abnormal" is not relevant in connection with this topic. Homosexual behaviour is a quite normal part of the social life of e.g. bonobos. Human standards can't be used in descriptions of normality in other species. Petter Bøckman (talk) 17:04, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Hi Petter, Thanks for joining us with your valuable input. I am the editor who started this discussion and used the word "abnormal" . Please do not worry, I have been shown the error of my overly statistical ways, and I don't think there is an issue with avoiding use of "abnormal". The concerns here (or at least my concerns) are that this is such an important subject in zoology, yet the article gives undue weight (in my opinion) to behaviours that occur with relatively less frequency. We have entire sub-sections that are based on just one or two examples (case-studies) and several citations of these lead to dead-links or sources of which the reliability is questioned. This is downgrading the overall quality of the article. Thankyou for providing the source of the 1,500 figure. I have found the information for the citation, but I feel uneasy about editing this into the article without having acually seen the source myself. Would it be possible for you to do this, please.__DrChrissy (talk) 17:35, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

I can't find the 1,500 figure in Biological Exuberance. It says (p. 673): "Same-sex courtship, sexual, pair-bonding, and /or parenting behaviors have been documented in the scientific literature in at least 167 species of mammals, 132 birds, 32 reptiles and amphibians 15 fishes, and 125 insects and other invertebrates, for a total of 471 species (see part 2 and appendix for a complete list). These figures do not include domesticated animals (at least another 19 species; see the appendix), nor species in which only sexually immature animals/juveniles engage in homosexual activities (for a survey of the latter in mammals, see Dagg 1984). For a number of reasons, this tally is likely to be an underestimate (especially for species other than mammals and birds, which are not as thoroughly covered): see chapter 3 for further discussion." Chapter 3 doesn't mention 1,500 either. KateWishing (talk) 21:22, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Thanks very much for doing this research. We should note that these numbers include animals showing same-sex pair bonding and/or parenting behaviour - these are not sexual behaviours. Same-sex "courtship" could also be easily confused with social facilitation and inter-male competition for females (e.g. at a lek, males may display to each other in the absence of a female.)__DrChrissy (talk) 16:36, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree the article per now has some problems. First off, is the term "sexual" referring to the sexes of the animals (i.e is this about gender specific behaviour) or does it refer to reproduction (i.e. reproductive behaviour) or both? Lots of this stuff is covered in other articles and should just be summarized here (the unfortunately named Animal co-opted sexual behavior seems to cater for much of it). Sexual behaviour hermaphroditic animals is lacking, the same is the reproductive behaviour of sessile animals and sexual behaviour as species barriers. Petter Bøckman (talk) 18:41, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Petter Bøckman, when you stated "is the term 'sexual' referring to the sexes of the animals (i.e is this about gender specific behaviour) or does it refer to reproduction (i.e. reproductive behaviour) or both?", are you referring to the title of the article as well? I think that the title is fine. Do you mean that the term sexual should be clarified in the article when the context is not clear? What I gather from the article and its sources is that the term sexual is usually referring to reproductive and/or non-reproductive behavior. As for the Animal co-opted sexual behavior article, KateWishing changed its title...per above. Flyer22 (talk) 21:35, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Hm, I was sure it was there, it's not a number of my own devising. Thank you for looking it up KateWishing. I'll see if I can track down the exact source when I get back to work.

Flyer22, the reason I asked about what meaning of "sexual" is meant here, is that there's a lot of gender specific behaviour in animals not necessarily connected to reproductive behaviour, and there's a lot of copulatory behaviour that is not gender specific. The term "sex" in English is a particularly imprecise term, covering bot copulation, physical gender and a host of copulation-related factors. In my own laguage, the title of this article, if translated directly, would only cover copulatory behaviour. Petter Bøckman (talk) 10:10, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

I tend to agree with Petter's comment above, which is why I have been adding images of courtship behaviour, but doesn't a "copulation" focussed definition mean that masturbation, oral sex and other behaviours would not be covered here?__DrChrissy (talk) 16:26, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

Petter Bøckman, I know about the different definitions of sex; I've studied these topics significantly and often edit sex topics on Wikipedia. But, like I stated above, "What I gather from the article and its sources is that the term sexual is usually referring to reproductive and/or non-reproductive behavior." I did not see what you were confused about. Of course, this article should clarify when sexual does not mean reproductive and/or non-reproductive behavior, but, in general, that's what it means in this article. It's not usually referring to the sex (as in gender) of the animal. The term sex refers to the sex/gender of humans and non-human animals far more than than the term sexual does. So we should definitely be clear when the term sex is used in this article, if the context is not already clear. When stating something like "The lions engaged in sex.", however, the context is clear...unless the context is also supposed to be clear on the reproductive aspect. In the case of being clear on the reproductive aspect, I would state "The lions copulated.," "The lions mated.", or "The lions engaged in copulatory sex.", or be clearer in some other way if that's not deemed clear enough.

DrChrissy, yes, as shown by this and this dictionary source, copulation most commonly means "sexual union; the transfer of the sperm from male to female; usually applied to the mating process in nonhuman animals," "Conjugation between two cells that do not fuse but separate after mutual fertilization," and "To engage in sexual intercourse in which the penis is inserted into the vagina." But as shown by this dictionary source and this Animal Behavior Desk Reference: A Dictionary of Animal Behavior, Ecology, and Evolution source from Taylor & Francis, pages 122–124, it may also mean sexual activity in general, including homosexual sexual activity. I don't see why the Animal sexual behaviour article should be restricted to reproductive behavior. It should be an umbrella article for all non-human animal sexual behavior, with wikilinks pointing to the main Wikipedia articles for certain topics if there are articles for those certain topics.

On a side note: There is no need to ping me to this talk page via WP:Echo since it's on my WP:Watchlist. Flyer22 (talk) 18:34, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

delete "Genetics and sex" section

The "Genetics and sex" section is poorly written, it is based on a single source, and this source was published in 1947. If this phenomenon is widely accepted in biology, we need better sources. Otherwise, I propose to delete the section.__DrChrissy (talk) 15:56, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Agree. Petter Bøckman (talk) 08:23, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Delete "Specific species" section

This article is a general article about animal sexual behaviour. To me, it seems highly adventurous to take this down to the species level within this article - this information should be on the species own page. I propose this section is replaced with a more general section including subsections on mammals, reptiles, amphibians, birds and fish, and major taxa of the invertebrates.__DrChrissy (talk) 17:18, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree this section could be profitably replaced with a more general section focused on the evolutionary consequences of various sexual behaviours, rather than the current lists of random trivia such as "Mating among clouded leopards usually occurs during December and March." --Epipelagic (talk) 23:50, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

I'm with Epipelagic. Petter Bøckman (talk) 08:23, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Formatting quotes

The article has many (maybe too many) extended quotes. I have replaced the formatting for these quotes with a new one which, in my view is attractive and preferable. The new formatting was taken from this featured article which was on the front page of Wikipedia yesterday. Feel free to revert if you object. --Epipelagic (talk) 00:43, 8 February 2015 (UTC)

I have been having similar concerns about the extended quotes. Yes, there are too many. They give too much space to what are often case-studies or single observations. My own preference is to put them in sentence form with " " around them, rather than making them stand out as if they have some sort of importance. They are often anecdotal and although verifiable, I do not trust the reliability.__DrChrissy (talk) 00:50, 8 February 2015 (UTC)

Sexual verses reproductive

It seems to me the distinction should be kept clear between sexual behaviour and reproductive behaviour. The Oxford Dictionary defines them this way:

• Sexual: "relating to the instincts, physiological processes, and activities connected with physical attraction or intimate physical contact between individuals".[1]
• Reproductive: "relating to or effecting reproduction".[2]

Perhaps there could be a sister article to this one called something like Animal reproductive behaviour. Some behaviours would cross over into both articles, for example, some aspects of cuckoldry could be regarded as sexual strategies, while others could be regarded as reproductive strategies. Might the current section titled "Mating systems" be better renamed and refocused as "Sexual strategies"? There is a somewhat sketchy article called Reproduction. If that is meant to be a general article, it should be expanded to include things like the reproduction of plants, bacteria and archaea and the self-replication of robots. --Epipelagic (talk) 20:50, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

An Animal reproductive behaviour article would be an unnecessary WP:Content fork since animal sexual behaviour, when in the context of non-human animals, so often means animal reproductive behaviour, as we've discussed higher up on the talk page. When non-human animal sexual behavior is discussed, it is usually in terms of reproductive behavior; that can quite adequately be covered in the Animal sexual behaviour article, as it has been for years. We have the Non-reproductive sexual behavior in animals article for animal sexual behavior that is not reproductive. And we have other WP:Spinout articles for other non-human animal sexual topics. WP:Spinout articles should ideally only be created when necessary. And like the Point of view (POV) forks section of WP:Content fork states, "Instead of resolving that disagreement by consensus, another version of the article (or another article on the same subject) is created to be developed according to a particular point of view. This second article is known as a 'POV fork' of the first, and is inconsistent with Wikipedia policies. The generally accepted policy is that all facts and major points of view on a certain subject should be treated in one article. As Wikipedia does not view article forking as an acceptable solution to disagreements between contributors, such forks may be merged, or nominated for deletion." Flyer22 (talk) 21:06, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

In other words, we should not be unnecessarily causing our readers to go to more than one article when they can get that information in one article. Flyer22 (talk) 21:10, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

Also, I don't see what is sketchy about the Reproduction article, unless it's the Same-sex reproduction section that needs better sources. That article does include discussion of the reproduction of plants and bacteria. But as for the self-replication of robots? WP:Undue weight comes into play on the robot aspect; reproduction does not usually refer to robots. Flyer22 (talk) 21:23, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

If you are going to respond to what I say Flyer, please read what I said. Your response entirely misses the point. Some sexual behaviour is related to reproductive behaviour but much is not, and vica versa. For example, a lot of reproductive behaviour is to do with nurture. --Epipelagic (talk) 21:27, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

The only inappropriate response in this section is your "21:27, 9 February 2015 (UTC)" response. I read your comment and I comprehended it. And it still stands that an Animal reproductive behaviour article would be an unnecessary WP:Content fork; the Animal sexual behaviour and the Non-reproductive sexual behavior in animals articles are clear that it would be. If you are going to respond to me, then leave your hostility regarding our disputes at WP:Anatomy and WP:Animal anatomy off this talk page. Flyer22 (talk) 21:33, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

Moving on: I will turn to sources for what I mean. I stated above, "When non-human animal sexual behavior is discussed, it is usually in terms of reproductive behavior." That is true. This is not a matter of "[s]ome sexual behaviour [being] related to reproductive behaviour"; it's about the fact that the term sexual behavior, when used in reference to non-human animals, is usually discussed in terms of reproductive behavior. And it's because of that fact that having an Animal reproductive behaviour article would be substantially redundant to the Animal sexual behaviour article. But when it comes to making a distinction between sexual behaviour and reproductive behaviour, the lead and lower parts of the Animal sexual behaviour article are clear that not all animal sexual behaviour is reproductively motivated. Some sources showing what I mean regarding the term sexual behavior usually being discussed in the context reproductive behavior when it comes to non-human animals are the following:

This Encyclopedia of Animal Science (Print) source from CRC Press, 2004, page 101, states, "Animal scientists study reproductive behavior for a variety of reasons, including seeking tools for obtaining direct economic benefit through improved reproductive performance. Learning how reproductive behavior develops and is regulated affords the ability to facilitate the expression of sexual behavior, a goal in many breeding systems." The source goes on to discuss a lot more reproductive behavior, often simply titling the activity "sexual behavior" or "sexual performance."

This Hormones and Reproduction of Vertebrates, Volume 1 source from Academic Press, 2010, page 119, states, "In species with sexual reproduction, 'sexual behavior' may be generally defined as the set of behavioral acts directed towards the goal of producing offspring [...] Classifying these behavioral acts into categories can be useful for descriptive purposes but in fishes the diversity of sexual displays challenges this classification."

This Motivation: Theory, Research, and Application source from Cengage Learning, 2012, page 24, states, "Some might argue that sexual motivation is not as important as the previously mentioned analysis suggests because many animals engage in sexual behavior only rarely, and sexual behavior usually occurs only when the female is receptive. These points, however, really show just the opposite; that is, reproduction is so important that the behaviors leading to impregnation must be reserved to those times when they are most likely to produce offspring. As Emilie Rissman (1995) notes, mammals evolved in the tropics when sexual receptivity tends to be year round, but researchers most often study animals that live in temperature zones where seasonal changes in temperature, food, and so forth make successful reproduction more likely at certain times of the year than at others. As a result of these seasonal changes, it is thought that cyclic sexual receptivity evolved to restrict sexual behavior to those times when successful reproduction was most likely to occur."

This The Encyclopædia of Sexual Behaviour, Volume 1 source from Elsevier, 2013, page 132, states, "Sexual behavior is one of the most basic and important types of social behavior, being directly associated with the process of reproduction. The most essential part of the process is, of course, the union of egg and sperm, in which the sperm moves toward and makes a connection with the egg." The source goes on to discuss a lot more animal sexual behavior, especially in the context of reproduction.

And as a bonus for wider discussion on the topic, this Comparative Psychology: A Handbook source from Taylor & Francis, 1998, discusses different sexual/reproductive systems. Flyer22 (talk) 23:21, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree with Epipelagic that we need to keep the two terms distinct. To my mind, reproductive behaviour includes many other behaviours such as nest building, parenting, familial co-operation, social bonding, etc; sexual behaviour is a subset of reproductive behaviour. I rather dislike the Oxford Dictionary definition though....any definition which states or hints that a behaviour is largely (exclusively) instinctive should always be viewed critically.__DrChrissy (talk) 23:57, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

Keeping the terms distinct is one thing; creating an unnecessary article is another. Per what I stated above, there is no need for an Animal reproductive behaviour article, and that article would indeed be a WP:Content fork; if it were created, I would seek to have it WP:Merged with the Animal sexual behaviour article exactly per what I have stated above. I would do that by starting a wide-scale WP:RfC, contacting all of the relevant WikiProjects and listing various sources to prove my point. Either way, we should be going by the sources, such as what the sources I listed above state. Flyer22 (talk) 00:20, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

Also, if one wants to state that sexual behaviour is a subset of reproductive behaviour, the reverse is obviously true -- reproductive behaviour is a subset of sexual behaviour. There are various sources stating the reverse, usually in the context of human sexuality, since, as I've been clear about, the sexual behavior of non-human animals is usually discussed in terms of reproduction. But I haven't seen as many sources making the case that sexual behaviour is a subset of reproductive behaviour. Flyer22 (talk) 00:32, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

On second thought: If an Animal reproductive behaviour article were created and showed itself as significantly distinct from the Animal sexual behaviour article, I would be okay with its creation. I still don't feel that such an article is needed, though. Flyer22 (talk) 00:45, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree with Flyer22, I think what we need is to have a clear concept of what we want in this article, and stick to it. Petter Bøckman (talk) 10:34, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you are saying Petter, and what it is that you agree with. --Epipelagic (talk) 19:16, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

I tried (clumsily) to imply that the lede should start by saying what the article is about, and then stick narrowly to that. Petter Bøckman (talk) 08:25, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

move "Less common non-reproductive sexual behaviour"

It seems to me that the information contained in "Less common non-reproductive sexual behaviour" in this article should be moved to Non-reproductive sexual behavior in animals with only a brief summary here and of course a link.__DrChrissy (talk) 00:54, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

Agreed. Don't be too brief, though. Flyer22 (talk) 00:55, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

Ditto. Petter Bøckman (talk) 08:29, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

@DrChrissy: The section used to be called "Types of activity", but someone added "less common" to the section title. Is the new section title based on original research, or has it been verified that all of these behaviors are "less common"? Jarble (talk) 00:18, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

Sex for pleasure

The material in this subsection is all about normal reproductive behavior, but it's currently classified as "less common" and "non-reproductive". Since pleasure is a normal component and motivation for reproductive sexual behaviour, and not a type of behavior itself, I propose renaming the "Neurochemistry and hormones" section to "Motivations" and moving this subsection there. KateWishing (talk) 12:49, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

I think we need to be extremely careful here. This is discussing emotions in animals which is fraught with difficulties. I think many people would accept that at least some mammalian species experience a positive emotion ("pleasure") from sexual behaviour (reproductive or not). However, you can not be certain that other animals (including other humans) experience emotions in the same way you do. Furthermore, where do we "draw the line" in the purported experience of "pleasure"? Do mating birds experience the same emotions as mammals? Do mating insects experience "pleasure"? Does a male fish shedding sperm into the water experience "pleasure"? If we are to go down this line we will need to be very sure of what we state. In the first instance, this must be better than verifying the subject-matter with a dead link to a source which looks like it is written in Dutch.__DrChrissy (talk) 14:42, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

The question is whether we can get some good sources. The latest thinking seems to favour the "pleasure principle" as put forward by Paul Vasey (see here) at least for higher vertebrates. Ideally, we should have some pro- and contra literature to show that is is not a settled question. Petter Bøckman (talk) 07:47, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

I'm afraid that straight away, I would be asking "what are higher vertebrates?" and how do we know that their affective states differ from other vertebrates and invertebrates?__DrChrissy (talk) 15:41, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Just go by what the WP:Reliable sources state. Flyer22 (talk) 17:14, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Indeed. Ideally we'd want proper secondary sources. However, the field has mover quite fast, so we may have to use primary sources or interviews like the one I just posted.

DrChrissy, you caught me there. I was intentionally vague. To my knowledge (and this is not my area of expertise) almost all research of sex-as-pleasurable is centred on birds and mammals. By the logic of phylogenetic bracketing, if sex is nice for birds and mammals, it should be so for reptiles too. The brain anatomy of amphibians are quite similar to reptiles, so whatever goes on in their brains is likely to also go in in amphibian brains. The problems is that the only things we actually know (or at least can gone an informed opinion on) is birds and mammals. I don't know the field well enough to say anything about fish, and the brain architecture is so different in arthropods and molluscs to say anything definite. As for other chordates and other deutrostomes, the brain is more or less absent in the adult animal, and they tend to be indiscriminate spawners.

Sorry to catch you on the hop - having worked with a range of animal species and their emotions for many years, it is often the first question I ask. I am not convinced by the idea of comparing brain architecture and deciding that because brains are different, one animal can not have the same experience as another. This is like comparing sense organs. Consider the compound eye of insects. It has virtually no structures resembling the mammalian eye, but would we argue that insects can not see? The compound eye is an analagous structure to the mammalian eye. It is entirely possible that many animals other than the handful of animals studied regarding pleasure have analagous brain architecture which means they can experience pleasure. It might be worth looking at Pain in invertebrates.

Edit: This article seems relevant and is fairly new: http://www.appliedanimalbehaviour.com/article/S0168-1591(09)00048-3/abstract. Petter Bøckman (talk) 20:04, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree that the section should include the varied views of reliable sources, but I'm not seeing any reason to leave it classified as a non-reproductive, uncommon type of behavior. It's a proposed motivation for reproductive, common behavior. I'll move the section and expand it with other sources, like the one Petter provided. KateWishing (talk) 21:22, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

@KateWishing. Unfortunately, your last edit has muddied the waters here. You were correct in saying as the very first part of this thread that this section was "all about normal reproductive behaviour". I agree, and the section at that moment should have been moved. However, you have now introduced non-reproductive sexual behaviour in this section. I am not disagreeing that "pleasure" probably motivates a dog to hump your leg, but I am saying we need to differentiate between these behaviours. The problem here is that pleasure probably motivates both reproductive mating and leg-humping. When a male dog mates with a female bitch, it is not motivated by thinking "I need to do this to pass on my genes and ensure my maximum level of biological fitness". Animals have evolved to behave in response to proximate stimuli, so the mating dog is responding to the smell of the female, the sight of her presenting herself, etc; not the long-term function of reproduction. Being capabile of experiencing pleasure is likely to have a very low cost to the animal, but it is an extremely powerful motivator. As such, I believe that experiencing pleasure as a consequence of mating is an ideal way of motivating the behaviour. The humping dog probably experiences a similar, if not identical, emotional state, but this, for whatever reason, is divorced from the function of reproduction and therefore needs to be discussed separately. Let's remember, not every dog humps legs, but almost every (entire) dog will mate a bitch in estrus.__DrChrissy (talk) 00:24, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

I don't see why it needs to be discussed separately. The article is about all sexual behavior, not only reproductive behavior. Anyway, the source for that statement is not specific to non-reproductive behavior; he just cites masturbation as the most convincing evidence that genital stimulation is pleasurable, which extends to all sexual behavior. KateWishing (talk) 00:42, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

I guess what I am saying is that I do not see why this article should be about all sexual behaviour. Coverage of minor instances or subsets of behaviour need to be balanced or elsewehere. For instance, the article Aggression mentions rape only once and murder only twice. The article Courtship does not mention either rape or homosexualty. The article Mating does not mention rape or homosexuality. I did not have to look hard to find these and they are not "cherry-picked". By the way, I was using masturbation as a generic term for non reproductive sexual behaviour. Sorry to cause confusion.__DrChrissy (talk) 01:16, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

Here is the sentence: "Jonathan Balcombe argues that the prevalence of non-reproductive sexual behavior in certain species suggests that sexual stimulation is pleasurable." The conclusion is not about non-reproductive behavior, it's that "sexual stimulation is pleasurable". It only mentions non-reproductive behavior in order to make a general point about sex, reproductive or not. In my opinion, this article should focus on reproductive sex, but not to the extent that we're forbidden from even acknowledging other kinds outside of a ghettoized section. KateWishing (talk) 01:27, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree with you entirely. I would not for one moment consider that the more unusual or less common aspects of sexual behaviour should not be mentioned on here, it is just that at the moment, there is undue weight on these.__DrChrissy (talk) 01:35, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

Angus John Bateman

The article conspicuously omits Bateman's principle, likely the single most fundamental theory governing sexual behaviour in animals. Any reason it is omitted? Petter Bøckman (talk) 08:43, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Yes Bateman's principle governing reproductive success is important and should certainly be included somewhere. As should these key modes of reproduction which I would like to include somewhere. But it is difficult to establish any coherent balance and focus for the article unless we are allowed to achieve some clarification of the "sexual verses reproductive" issue I attempted to raise above. --Epipelagic (talk) 23:35, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with Epiplagic here. I have become increasingly frustrated with the development of this article because there seems to be a resistance to the idea that most sexual behaviour in animals has a function - the passing of genes from one generation to another. Yes there are studies out there (many of which are case studies or of extremely dubious quality) saying dogs hump legs, but these are diluting this extremely important article. We have not touched on the wonderful courtship behaviour of so many animals, the difference between animals in their mating behaviour, or the titilating facts such as the average orgasm of a domestic boar last 9.5 mins and he produces 1.5 litres of semen. I am strongly of the mind to move this non-reproductive information to Non-reproductive sexual behaviour in animals. We can then get rid of the case-studies, headlines written by incompetent news-reporters, zoo blogs, comments by a Dutch committee with only 2 experts on it and which nobody can link to, and get on with writing an encyclopaedic article without undue weight on "unusualities"__DrChrissy (talk) 00:42, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

As was stated in the #Abnormal animal sexual behaviour section above, non-reproductive sexual behavior in animals should be included in the Animal sexual behaviour article, but the vast majority of it should be in the article specifically about that topic -- Non-reproductive sexual behavior in animals. Flyer22 (talk) 01:00, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

I don't think we need to mention the modes of reproduction more than in passim, we're after the behaviour that follow from them, rather than reproduction modes themselves. We'll need to include things like spermatophores in salamanders and scorpions, spawning (already mentioned under "Seasonality") etc.

Non-reproductive sexual behaviour: I think it would work if we had a chapter on the "Pleasure principle", and there mention things like sex-as-social glue, sex-as-apeacement, masturbation etc. Quite a bit of sex-as-social glue shouold go under the "monogamy" heading. Petter Bøckman (talk) 12:24, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

Placement of the Rape (sexual coercion) section

I meant to address this two or three days ago: The Rape section is currently placed as a subsection of the Less common sexual behaviours section. How do we know that rape (sexual coercion) is a less common sexual behavior among non-human animals? Read the Sexual coercion article and other texts on this topic, and it's easy to see that sexual coercion is very common among non-human animals...for the reasons that the lead of the Sexual coercion article currently states. Furthermore, given that the term rape is usually used in reference to humans (as a legal term) and not non-human animals, the Rape section should be titled Sexual coercion instead; titling it that would also obviously match the "Main article" link that that's there. Flyer22 (talk) 20:46, 16 February 2015 (UTC)

I would solve this by changing "Less common sexual behaviours" back to "Types of activity." Coercion, hermaphroditism, cuckoldry, sexual cannibalism, non-reproductive acts, etc. are all normal for many species. Most sexual behaviors (e.g., monogamy or vivipary) are "uncommon" in the sense that they occur in a minority of species, so I don't see a reason to segregate only these (without any source for their prevalence). KateWishing (talk) 21:14, 16 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree. I have been trying to arrange these behaviours according to their commonality in the animal kingdom. But, there is often insufficient detail out there to make even an educated guess as to the commonality or frequency. For example, I suspect that hermaphroditism is perhaps the most frequent, given the number of invertebrates that are hermaphrodites. My question is where do we put topics such as Pavlovian Conditioning, which is largely brought about by human activites, and viewing panda porn? Suggestions are welcome.__DrChrissy (talk) 22:06, 16 February 2015 (UTC)

To avoid undue emphasis, perhaps we could remove the headers for "Prostitution", "Pavlovian conditioning" and "Viewing images", and combine them as "Other". KateWishing (talk) 22:11, 16 February 2015 (UTC)

Sounds like a very good idea to me!__DrChrissy (talk) 22:13, 16 February 2015 (UTC)

Jarble, what you stated above is being discussed in section. Flyer22 (talk) 00:22, 17 February 2015 (UTC)