Ballen and her colleagues staged interactions between pairs of chameleons when the animals were two months old. The researchers found the two groups didn’t differ in aggression, but chameleons raised in isolation were more submissive than their siblings raised in groups. The isolation-reared chameleons tended to flee or curl into a ball during confrontations with other chameleons, and they adopted darker and less green colors than the group-reared chameleons. The researchers also tested the foraging ability of the animals, and found that group-reared chameleons seized their prey (crickets) faster than isolation-reared chameleons.

Studies like this add to an increasing appreciation of the flexibility and complexity of reptile behavior.