Amur tigers described as 'majestic' are healthier and have more sex than others

Scientists in China wanted to assess the personality traits of Amur tigers (Siberian tigers), which I think is an interesting concept not tried before as far as I know. They probably struggled to distinguish between different personality traits as described in humans but came up with two types: majestic and steady. 

In general terms they found that the majestic tigers were healthier because they had a higher status and had (by the looks of it) first pickings of prey animals. And they mate more often. That last point begs the question as to whether majestic tigers are coveted by tigresses. Do tigresses pick and choose their male mates? It looks that way.

Female lions prefer males with dark and great manes for instance. It seems that female wild cats have a method for picking out the healthiest males in order to produce healthy offspring.

Tigers described as majestic are healthier than others and have sex more often. Image: MikeB.

AI summary

This section is a summary of the study as written by an artificial intelligence computer online, ChatGPT.

This study aimed to explore individual differences in tiger personality and investigate whether there are personality dimensions analogous to the Big Five in human personality research. 

The researchers collected data from 152 tigers living in the world's largest semi-wild tiger sanctuary in North Eastern China and a second sample of 96 tigers living in another sanctuary. 

The second sample allowed them to assess the replicability of the personality dimensions or factors reported in the first sample.

The researchers identified two personality factors, Majesty and Steadiness, which explained 21% and 17% of the variance among items. 

Tigers that scored higher on Majesty were found to be healthier, eat more live prey, have higher group status among other tigers as assessed by human raters, and mate more often. 

The study provides some ethological context to put flesh on the quantitative bones of these findings concerning these magnificent and charismatic animals.

Overall, this study contributes to our understanding of tiger personality and how it may relate to various outcomes such as health, social status, and mating frequency.