Which of the following statements best exemplifies the difference between a population and an individual?

a. Genetic changes do not occur within the individual.

b. Birth rates, death rates, immigration rates, and so on are features possessed by populations, not individuals.

c. Population ecology examines features that cannot be studied on an individual organism.

d. All of the above exemplify the difference between a population and an individual.

e. None of the above.

d. All of the above exemplify the difference between a population and an individual.

Explanation:

A population is a group of individuals of the same species that live in a particular geographical area and are able to interbreed. A population is described with respect to several features such as death and birth rates, age structure, density, dispersion, change in the population size due to density-dependent and density-independent factors and the survivorship curve.

These features are not exhibited by a particular individual. Natural selection also works at populations. The evolutionary forces act upon populations to change their allele and genotype frequencies. Therefore, populations are the unit of evolution and change genetically over time, not the individuals. Population ecology studies the size of a populations and the trends and causes of changes in the populations over time.