toggle visibility Search & Display Options

Select All    Deselect All
 |   | 
Details
   print
  Records Links
Author Mench, J.A.; Morrow-Tesch, J.; Chu, L.-R. isbn  openurl
  Title Environmental enrichment for farm animals Type Journal Article
  Year 1998 Publication Lab Animal Abbreviated Journal Lab Anim.  
  Volume 27 Issue Pages 32-36  
  Keywords  
  Abstract  
  Address  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
  Language Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition (up)  
  ISSN ISBN ISSN : 0093-7355 Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 6188  
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Leadbeater, E.; Dawson, E.H. url  openurl
  Title A social insect perspective on the evolution of social learning mechanisms Type Journal Article
  Year 2017 Publication Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Abbreviated Journal Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.  
  Volume 114 Issue 30 Pages 7838-7845  
  Keywords  
  Abstract The social world offers a wealth of opportunities to learn from others, and across the animal kingdom individuals capitalize on those opportunities. Here, we explore the role of natural selection in shaping the processes that underlie social information use, using a suite of experiments on social insects as case studies. We illustrate how an associative framework can encompass complex, context-specific social learning in the insect world and beyond, and based on the hypothesis that evolution acts to modify the associative process, suggest potential pathways by which social information use could evolve to become more efficient and effective. Social insects are distant relatives of vertebrate social learners, but the research we describe highlights routes by which natural selection could coopt similar cognitive raw material across the animal kingdom.  
  Address  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
  Language Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition (up)  
  ISSN ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes 10.1073/pnas.1620744114 Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 6189  
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Riley, J.L.; Noble, D.W.A.; Byrne, R.W.; Whiting, M.J. url  doi
openurl 
  Title Does social environment influence learning ability in a family-living lizard? Type Journal Article
  Year 2017 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.  
  Volume 20 Issue 3 Pages 449-458  
  Keywords  
  Abstract Early developmental environment can have profound effects on individual physiology, behaviour, and learning. In birds and mammals, social isolation during development is known to negatively affect learning ability; yet in other taxa, like reptiles, the effect of social isolation during development on learning ability is unknown. We investigated how social environment affects learning ability in the family-living tree skink (Egernia striolata). We hypothesized that early social environment shapes cognitive development in skinks and predicted that skinks raised in social isolation would have reduced learning ability compared to skinks raised socially. Offspring were separated at birth into two rearing treatments: (1) raised alone or (2) in a pair. After 1 year, we quantified spatial learning ability of skinks in these rearing treatments (N = 14 solitary, 14 social). We found no effect of rearing treatment on learning ability. The number of skinks to successfully learn the task, the number of trials taken to learn the task, the latency to perform the task, and the number of errors in each trial did not differ between isolated and socially reared skinks. Our results were unexpected, yet the facultative nature of this species' social system may result in a reduced effect of social isolation on behaviour when compared to species with obligate sociality. Overall, our findings do not provide evidence that social environment affects development of spatial learning ability in this family-living lizard.  
  Address  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
  Language Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition (up)  
  ISSN 1435-9456 ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Riley2017 Serial 6190  
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Liedtke, J.; Schneider, J.M. url  doi
openurl 
  Title Social makes smart: rearing conditions affect learning and social behaviour in jumping spiders Type Journal Article
  Year 2017 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.  
  Volume 20 Issue 6 Pages 1093-1106  
  Keywords  
  Abstract There is a long-standing debate as to whether social or physical environmental aspects drive the evolution and development of cognitive abilities. Surprisingly few studies make use of developmental plasticity to compare the effects of these two domains during development on behaviour later in life. Here, we present rearing effects on the development of learning abilities and social behaviour in the jumping spider Marpissa muscosa. These spiders are ideally suited for this purpose because they possess the ability to learn and can be reared in groups but also in isolation without added stress. This is a critical but rarely met requirement for experimentally varying the social environment to test its impact on cognition. We split broods of spiders and reared them either in a physically or in a socially enriched environment. A third group kept under completely deprived conditions served as a 'no-enrichment' control. We tested the spiders' learning abilities by using a modified T-maze. Social behaviour was investigated by confronting spiders with their own mirror image. Results show that spiders reared in groups outperform their conspecifics from the control, i.e. 'no-enrichment', group in both tasks. Physical enrichment did not lead to such an increased performance. We therefore tentatively suggest that growing up in contact with conspecifics induces the development of cognitive abilities in this species.  
  Address  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
  Language Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition (up)  
  ISSN 1435-9456 ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Liedtke2017 Serial 6191  
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Whalen, A.; Cownden, D.; Laland, K. url  doi
openurl 
  Title The learning of action sequences through social transmission Type Journal Article
  Year 2015 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.  
  Volume 18 Issue 5 Pages 1093-1103  
  Keywords  
  Abstract Previous empirical work on animal social learning has found that many species lack the ability to learn entire action sequences solely through reliance on social information. Conversely, acquiring action sequences through asocial learning can be difficult due to the large number of potential sequences arising from even a small number of base actions. In spite of this, several studies report that some primates use action sequences in the wild. We investigate how social information can be integrated with asocial learning to facilitate the learning of action sequences. We formalize this problem by examining how learners using temporal difference learning, a widely applicable model of reinforcement learning, can combine social cues with their own experiences to acquire action sequences. The learning problem is modeled as a Markov decision process. The learning of nettle processing by mountain gorillas serves as a focal example. Through simulations, we find that the social facilitation of component actions can combine with individual learning to facilitate the acquisition of action sequences. Our analysis illustrates that how even simple forms of social learning, combined with asocial learning, generate substantially faster learning of action sequences compared to asocial processes alone, and that the benefits of social information increase with the length of the action sequence and the number of base actions.  
  Address  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
  Language Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition (up)  
  ISSN 1435-9456 ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Whalen2015 Serial 6192  
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Kis, A.; Huber, L.; Wilkinson, A. url  doi
openurl 
  Title Social learning by imitation in a reptile (Pogona vitticeps) Type Journal Article
  Year 2015 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim.Cogn.  
  Volume 18 Issue 1 Pages 325-331  
  Keywords  
  Abstract The ability to learn through imitation is thought to be the basis of cultural transmission and was long considered a distinctive characteristic of humans. There is now evidence that both mammals and birds are capable of imitation. However, nothing is known about these abilities in the third amniotic class--reptiles. Here, we use a bidirectional control procedure to show that a reptile species, the bearded dragon (Pogona vitticeps), is capable of social learning that cannot be explained by simple mechanisms such as local enhancement or goal emulation. Subjects in the experimental group opened a trap door to the side that had been demonstrated, while subjects in the ghost control group, who observed the door move without the intervention of a conspecific, were unsuccessful. This, together with differences in behaviour between experimental and control groups, provides compelling evidence that reptiles possess cognitive abilities that are comparable to those observed in mammals and birds and suggests that learning by imitation is likely to be based on ancient mechanisms.  
  Address  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
  Language Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition (up)  
  ISSN 1435-9456 ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Kis2015 Serial 6193  
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Brust, V.; Guenther, A. url  doi
openurl 
  Title Domestication effects on behavioural traits and learning performance: comparing wild cavies to guinea pigs Type Journal Article
  Year 2015 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.  
  Volume 18 Issue 1 Pages 99-109  
  Keywords  
  Abstract The domestication process leads to a change in behavioural traits, usually towards individuals that are less attentive to changes in their environment and less aggressive. Empirical evidence for a difference in cognitive performance, however, is scarce. Recently, a functional linkage between an individual's behaviour and cognitive performance has been proposed in the framework of animal personalities via a shared risk-reward trade-off. Following this assumption, bolder and more aggressive animals (usually the wild form) should learn faster. Differences in behaviour may arise during ontogeny due to individual experiences or represent adaptations that occurred over the course of evolution. Both might singly or taken together account for differences in cognitive performance between wild and domestic lineages. To test for such possible linkages, we compared wild cavies and domestic guinea pigs, both kept in a university stock for more than 30 years under highly comparable conditions. Animals were tested in three behavioural tests as well as for initial and reversal learning performance. Guinea pigs were less bold and aggressive than their wild congeners, but learnt an association faster. Additionally, the personality structure was altered during the domestication process. The most likely explanation for these findings is that a shift in behavioural traits and their connectivity led to an altered cognitive performance. A functional linkage between behavioural and cognitive traits seems to exist in the proposed way only under natural selection, but not in animals that have been selected artificially over centuries.  
  Address  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
  Language Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition (up)  
  ISSN 1435-9456 ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Brust2015 Serial 6194  
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Monfardini, E.; Hadj-Bouziane, F.; Meunier, M. url  doi
openurl 
  Title Model-Observer Similarity, Error Modeling and Social Learning in Rhesus Macaques Type Journal Article
  Year 2014 Publication Plos One Abbreviated Journal Plos One  
  Volume 9 Issue 2 Pages e89825  
  Keywords  
  Abstract Monkeys readily learn to discriminate between rewarded and unrewarded items or actions by observing their conspecifics. However, they do not systematically learn from humans. Understanding what makes human-to-monkey transmission of knowledge work or fail could help identify mediators and moderators of social learning that operate regardless of language or culture, and transcend inter-species differences. Do monkeys fail to learn when human models show a behavior too dissimilar from the animals' own, or when they show a faultless performance devoid of error? To address this question, six rhesus macaques trained to find which object within a pair concealed a food reward were successively tested with three models: a familiar conspecific, a 'stimulus-enhancing' human actively drawing the animal's attention to one object of the pair without actually performing the task, and a 'monkey-like' human performing the task in the same way as the monkey model did. Reward was manipulated to ensure that all models showed equal proportions of errors and successes. The 'monkey-like' human model improved the animals' subsequent object discrimination learning as much as a conspecific did, whereas the 'stimulus-enhancing' human model tended on the contrary to retard learning. Modeling errors rather than successes optimized learning from the monkey and 'monkey-like' models, while exacerbating the adverse effect of the 'stimulus-enhancing' model. These findings identify error modeling as a moderator of social learning in monkeys that amplifies the models' influence, whether beneficial or detrimental. By contrast, model-observer similarity in behavior emerged as a mediator of social learning, that is, a prerequisite for a model to work in the first place. The latter finding suggests that, as preverbal infants, macaques need to perceive the model as 'like-me' and that, once this condition is fulfilled, any agent can become an effective model.  
  Address  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Public Library of Science Place of Publication Editor  
  Language Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition (up)  
  ISSN ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 6195  
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Webster, M.M.; Laland, K.N. url  doi
openurl 
  Title Social learning strategies and predation risk: minnows copy only when using private information would be costly Type Journal Article
  Year 2008 Publication Proc Biol Sci Abbreviated Journal Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B  
  Volume 275 Issue 1653 Pages 2869-2876  
  Keywords  
  Abstract Animals can acquire information from the environment privately, by sampling it directly, or socially, through learning from others. Generally, private information is more accurate, but expensive to acquire, while social information is cheaper but less reliable. Accordingly, the 'costly information hypothesis' predicts that individuals will use private information when the costs associated with doing so are low, but that they should increasingly use social information as the costs of using private information rise. While consistent with considerable data, this theory has yet to be directly tested in a satisfactory manner. We tested this hypothesis by giving minnows (Phoxinus phoxinus) a choice between socially demonstrated and non-demonstrated prey patches under conditions of low, indirect and high simulated predation risk. Subjects had no experience (experiment 1) or prior private information that conflicted with the social information provided by the demonstrators (experiment 2). In both experiments, subjects spent more time in the demonstrated patch than in the non-demonstrated patch, and in experiment 1 made fewer switches between patches, when risk was high compared with when it was low. These findings are consistent with the predictions of the costly information hypothesis, and imply that minnows adopt a 'copy-when-asocial-learning-is-costly' learning strategy.  
  Address  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
  Language Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition (up)  
  ISSN ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 6196  
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Knolle, F.; Goncalves, R.P.; Morton, A.J. url  doi
openurl 
  Title Sheep recognize familiar and unfamiliar human faces from two-dimensional images Type Journal Article
  Year 2017 Publication Royal Society Open Science Abbreviated Journal  
  Volume 4 Issue 11 Pages  
  Keywords  
  Abstract One of the most important human social skills is the ability to recognize faces. Humans recognize familiar faces easily, and can learn to identify unfamiliar faces from repeatedly presented images. Sheep are social animals that can recognize other sheep as well as familiar humans. Little is known, however, about their holistic face-processing abilities. In this study, we trained eight sheep (Ovis aries) to recognize the faces of four celebrities from photographic portraits displayed on computer screens. After training, the sheep chose the 'learned-familiar' faces rather than the unfamiliar faces significantly above chance. We then tested whether the sheep could recognize the four celebrity faces if they were presented in different perspectives. This ability has previously been shown only in humans. Sheep successfully recognized the four celebrity faces from tilted images. Interestingly, there was a drop in performance with the tilted images (from 79.22 ± 7.5% to 66.5 ± 4.1%) of a magnitude similar to that seen when humans perform this task. Finally, we asked whether sheep could recognize a very familiar handler from photographs. Sheep identified the handler in 71.8 ± 2.3% of the trials without pretraining. Together these data show that sheep have advanced face-recognition abilities, comparable with those of humans and non-human primates.  
  Address  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
  Language Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition (up)  
  ISSN ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 6197  
Permanent link to this record
Select All    Deselect All
 |   | 
Details
   print