Local ecology, stress, hormones and other factors may influence how animals care for their young, and David Westneat is working with a local population of house sparrows to understand how all these variables come together to affect the parenting "personalities" of birds and other creatures.

Westneat, professor in the University of Kentucky College of Arts and Sciences Department of Biology, has been awarded a four-year grant from the National Science Foundation for $670,000. As a behavioral ecologist with expertise on reproductive and social behavior, Westneat will use the grant to study variation in parenting patterns.

photos by Dana Rogers