Metabolic rate changes in house crickets (Acheta Domestica) exposed to various cricket calls

Abstract

We chose to conduct an experiment on how cricket chirps had an effect on their metabolic rates. We wanted to conduct this experiment due to the lack of information surrounding this topic. Thus, we hypothesized that when exposed to another cricket chirping, the metabolic rate of the cricket increases due to social interaction. To test this we measured the carbon dioxide output of crickets with no sound or listening to either an aggressive or courtship chip. We found that the crickets in our controlled group had a higher average mass-specific metabolic rate than either of our experimental groups. The average mass-specific metabolic rate of our controlled group was found to be 1.67 ppm/s/g. While our aggressive calling group was found to be 1.10 ppm/s/g and the courtship calling group was found to be 1.04 ppm/s/g. Due to our findings, we reject our original hypothesis and conclude that the sound caused the crickets to have a lower average mass-specific metabolic rate.