Aquatic habitats often undergo fluctuation of food resources. Fish species in field usually show highly flexible in metabolism and behavior. Such adaptive adjustments to food availability have important evolutionary and ecological relevance. In order to study influences of food abundance on the behavior and energetic metabolism of a common cyprinid fish species, we selected the female pale chub (Zacco platypus) as experimental subjects. We measured the standard metabolic rate (SMR), personality (including boldness, exploration, activity and sociability), and the schooling behavior (indicated by cohesion and coordination) of the experimental fish before and after four weeks of treatment (either once daily to satiated as low food availability group or twice daily to satiate as high food availability group). The main results of this study are as follows: 1) both body mass and the SMR of fish in high food availability group increased significantly whereas neither variable of fish in low availability group changed during experimental period. Thus fish in high food availability group showed higher body mass and SMR than those of low food availability group at the end of the experiment. 2) Food availability showed no significant effect on personality traits of pale chub. However, the activity indicated by swimming speed was higher while cohesion indicated by inter-individual distance of fish was lower (the inter-individual distance was longer) in low food availability group compared to fish in high food availability group when measured during schooling. 3) Only fish in high food availability group showed repeatability in SMR. The study suggested that the personality of pale chub exhibited stability which was insensitive to the change of food availability. The pale chub from low food availability group showed lower SMR, higher activity but lower cohesion during shoaling compared to those from high food availability group. It might possibly due to the adaptive down-regulation of maintenance metabolism and the enhanced competition for food resources under food shortage condition.