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How do fish change their gender? Are there really smart fishes having formed social constructs related to their sex?
I'm not an expert, but I imagine when they change sex, their behaviour changes accordingly.
They don't need to understand social constructs - they're changing gender as a result of changing sex.
That’s a stretch. Social constructs are parts of culture. They can be transmitted person to person and they evolve independently of genetics. Is there any evidence that fish have culture? I doubt it.
Look at how men used to dress in Mozart’s time. That was considered the height of masculine fashion. Today a man would have his masculinity questioned for dressing the same way (or otherwise thought of as strange). Nothing about our genetics could explain such a shift in preferences. There’s no reason Mozart-style fashion couldn’t make a return at some point. That is culture. Fish don’t have it, thus they don’t have gender at all.
According to the definition posted above, the cultural expressions of biological sex are only one dimension of gender, and you're ignoring the other aspects. I'll accept fish don't have culture, though I bet someone more knowledgeable than I could argue that point. However, let's look at social behavior via a vis courtship rituals. Like birds, some fish develop pretty incredible displays for getting it on. If a fish which has changed its biological sex then changes it's behavior during courtship, that would seem, to me, to indicate a different expression of biological sex independent of genetics (i.e. gender). Unless there is a genealogical basis for courtship displays, which I don't believe to be the case.
You can argue along those lines but then you’re ultimately arguing against the sex-gender distinction. If you read the full Wikipedia article on gender posted above essentially none of it applies to fish whose behaviour is entirely biological and environmental. We know this because you can substitute any fish in any role for another of the same species and see entirely predictable results.
Many biologists (myself included) don't anthropomorphize animals because it's impossible to objectively quantify things like "culture". So, my opinion is that some fish change sex, and not their gender (because fish don't have genders, which are human social constructs).
Happy to be corrected if I'm off-base. I'm not an ichthyologist.
Patterns of behavior typically tied to one sex or the other. Like doing mating dances or building nests.