Neotropical understory birds and mammals show divergent behaviour responses to human pressure

•Diel activity of 45% of birds and 36% of mammals assessed significantly changed in areas with higher human pressures.•In general Mammals became more nocturnal, while birds became more diurnal.•For birds increased diurnality may not be strongly associated with direct human pressures like hunting, and instead with habitat disturbance.•Our results align with other studies that show increased nocturnality for mammals in areas with high human pressure.•Opposing behavioural responses to humans among vertebrates have repercussions for intraguild predation, competition and conservation considerations.