Complex Behavior of Great White Sharks

A Great White Sharks spectrum of an unstoppable eating-machine, the white shark is actually a social animal, exhibiting a raft of complex behaviors. Many white sharks, both adult and immature, have slash and puncture wounds of superficial nature to the head and dorsum, which are inflicted by the teeth of rivals during brief bouts of intra-specific aggression and competition, especially near food resources but very likely also through courtship or other social interactions. 

Aggression between these sharks is very inhibited, considering the potential for severe wounding or worse, and includes rather cursory bashing, slashing and grab-release biting with both the upper and lower-jaw teeth. Where elicited on inanimate items offered to white sharks, much of this casual mouthing seems to be investigative rather than any attempt to ingest, and the observer is left with an overwhelming image of the shark using its fearsome jaws with very fine control for tactile sense and manipulation as well as for actual feeding. Whilst white shark attacks are often explained through a process of 'mistaken identity' with natural prey, underwater observations suggest that the sharks readily distinguish between humans and prey-animals.

Great White Shark

As white sharks apparently interact socially by low-intensity biting and grabbing, at least some oral contact with humans and other animals that are not regular prey may have a social framework, with sharks behaving with humans as they would with other sharks. Humans in such interactions may not understand what the shark's body language they my take it as an unwanted response.

It had long been assumed that, like other sharks, the Great White operates largely on the basis of instinct of a behavior, usually directed toward objects in the environment that is more complex than simple reflexes. Certain instinctive behaviors may be modified through learning, but most tend toward a narrow, predictable response.