Post-Doctoral Fellow

Konrad Lorenz Institute of Ethology, University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna

I am a behavioural ecologist particularly interested in the environmental factors that promote or constrain social and behavioural plasticity in highly social species. So far, my research focused on fish and mammal species that show a high degree of sociality (i.e. cooperative breeder) to understand the proximate mechanisms and ultimate fitness consequences of behavioural plasticity. In my research I am using an interdisciplinary approach that combines long-term behavioural experiments with molecular and genetic analysis to gain a comprehensive understanding of the evolution of social and behavioural phenotypes.

Currently, I am a WWTF-funded Postdoctoral Researcher and I investigate how stress (chronic and acute) determines behavioural flexibility using the highly social cichlid, Neolamprologus pulcher.

Current project:  Coping with change: Investigating the relationships between behavioural flexibility, stress and early environment

Funded by the Vienna Science and Technology Fund (WWTF)

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stefan.fischer@vetmeduni.ac.at

+43-1-250777404