Habit, equivalent tohabitus in some applications inbiology, refers variously to aspects of behaviour or structure, as follows:
Inzoology,habit (not to be confused withhabitus as described below) usually refers to a specificbehavior pattern, either adopted,learned, pathological,innate, or directly related tophysiology. For example:
Mode of life (orlifestyle,modus vivendi) is a concept related tohabit, and it is sometimes referred to as thehabit of an animal. It may refer to thelocomotor capabilities, as in "(motilehabit",sessile, errant, sedentary),feeding behaviour and mechanisms, nutrition mode (free-living,parasitic,holozoic,saprotrophic,trophic type), type ofhabitat (terrestrial,arboreal,aquatic,marine, freshwater, seawater,benthic,pelagic,nektonic,planktonic, etc.), period of activity (diurnal,nocturnal), types ofecological interaction, etc.
The habits of plants and animals often change responding to changes in theirenvironment. For example: if a species develops a disease or there is a drastic change of habitat or local climate, or it is removed to a different region, then the normal habits may change. Such changes may be eitherpathological, oradaptive.[4]
Inbotany, habit is the general appearance, growth form, orarchitecture. For example:
Plants may bewoody orherbaceous. The main types of woody plants aretrees,shrubs andlianas. Climbing plants (vines) can be woody (lianas) or herbaceous (nonwoody vines). Plants can also be categorized in terms of theirhabit assubshrubs (dwarf shrub, bush),cushion plants andsucculents.[5]
There is some overlap between the classifications of plants according to their habit and theirlife-form.
Other terms in biology refer similarly to varioustaxa; for example:
Since the distinction between the concepts – mode of behavior andmorphological form – are significant in zoology, the termhabitus (from which the wordhabit derives) is used to describe form as distinct from behaviour (habit). The termhabitus also occurs in botanical texts, but there it is used almost interchangeably withhabit, because plant behaviour generally does not correspond closely to the concept of habits in the zoological sense.[6]
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| Bacteria and fungi | ||
| Protists | ||
| Plants | ||
| Invertebrates | ||
| Mammals | ||
| Other vertebrates | ||
| Glossaries | ||
| Related topics | ||
