{"id":8574,"date":"2019-05-22T16:09:11","date_gmt":"2019-05-22T16:09:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/niche_-ecology\/"},"modified":"2019-05-22T16:09:11","modified_gmt":"2019-05-22T16:09:11","slug":"niche_-ecology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/niche_-ecology\/","title":{"rendered":"Niche (ecology)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In ecology, the status of organism in the ecosystem, including its habitat&nbsp;and its effect on other organisms and the environment. &nbsp;It includes the physical or abiotic environment that covers factors such as soil type and climate, as well as how a species has adapted to living in its habitat. &nbsp;According to the principle of competitive exclusion, no two species can occupy the same niche in the same environment for a protracted period of time. &nbsp;A variety of different species can constitute a community, but each one occupies its own niche. Accordingly, niche is not synonymous with habitat: many species may share a habitat, but this is not the case with a niche. &nbsp;The principle should not be applied in a rigid fashion. &nbsp;For example, the coyote and fox occupy a similar niche in the grassland communities of North America. &nbsp;The origin of the term &#8216;niche&#8217; as used in ecology is credited to the biologist <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mammalsociety.org\/uploads\/HGrinnell1940.pdf\" class=\"cc-route-enabled\" target=\"_self\" data-editable-link=\"http:\/\/www.mammalsociety.org\/uploads\/HGrinnell1940.pdf&amp;target=_self\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Joseph Grinell<\/a> (1877-1939). &nbsp;The notion of an ecological niche was applied to that of a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sgiquarterly.org\/feature2009Jan-2.html\" class=\"cc-route-enabled\" target=\"_self\" data-editable-link=\"http:\/\/www.sgiquarterly.org\/feature2009Jan-2.html&amp;target=_self\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">developmental niche<\/a>, a concept put forward by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.familystudies.uconn.edu\/contact\/faculty\/storrs_faculty_super.html\" class=\"cc-route-enabled\" target=\"_self\" data-editable-link=\"http:\/\/www.familystudies.uconn.edu\/contact\/faculty\/storrs_faculty_super.html&amp;target=_self\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Charles M. Super<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.familystudies.uconn.edu\/contact\/faculty\/storrs_faculty_harkness.html\" class=\"cc-route-enabled\" target=\"_self\" data-editable-link=\"http:\/\/www.familystudies.uconn.edu\/contact\/faculty\/storrs_faculty_harkness.html&amp;target=_self\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Sara Harkness<\/a> in the 1980s, and particularly pertinent to the study of child development cross-culturally. &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>See <a href=\"adaptation\">Adaptation<\/a>, <a href=\"community_-ecology-\">Community (ecology)<\/a>, <a href=\"competitive_exclusion_model\">Competitive exclusion model<\/a>, <a href=\"ecology\">Ecology<\/a>, <a href=\"ecosystem\">Ecosystem<\/a>, <a href=\"environment\">Environment<\/a>, <a href=\"environment_of_evolutionary_adaptedness\">Environment of evolutionary adaptedness<\/a>, <a href=\"evolutionary_niche_theory\">Evolutionary niche theory<\/a>, Habitat<\/p>\n<p><\/body><\/html><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In ecology, the status of organism in the ecosystem, including its habitat&nbsp;and its effect on other organisms and the environment. &nbsp;It includes the physical or abiotic environment that covers factors such as soil type and climate, as well as how a species has adapted to living in its habitat. &nbsp;According to the principle of competitive &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/niche_-ecology\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Niche (ecology)&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2],"class_list":["post-8574","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-glossary","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8574","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8574"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8574\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8574"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8574"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8574"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}