|   | 
Details
   web
Records
Author Friedrich, A.M.; Clement, T.S.; Zentall, T.R.
Title Functional equivalence in pigeons involving a four-member class Type Journal Article
Year 2004 Publication Behavioural processes Abbreviated Journal Behav. Process.
Volume 67 Issue 3 Pages 395-403
Keywords Animals; *Association Learning; *Behavior, Animal; *Cognition; Columbidae; *Concept Formation
Abstract Research suggests that animals are capable of forming functional equivalence relations or stimulus classes of the kind usually demonstrated by humans (e.g., the class defined by an object and the word for that object). In pigeons, such functional equivalences are typically established using many-to-one matching-to-sample in which two samples are associated with one comparison stimulus and two different samples are associated with the other. Evidence for the establishment of functional equivalences between samples associated with the same comparison comes from transfer tests. In Experiment 1, we found that pigeons can form a single class consisting of four members (many-to-one matching) when the alternative class has only one member (one-to-one matching). In Experiment 2, we ruled out the possibility that the pigeons acquired the hybrid one-to-one/many-to-one task by developing a single-code/default coding strategy as earlier research suggested that it might. Thus, pigeons can develop a functional class consisting of as many as four members, with the alternative class consisting of a single member.
Address (up) Department of Psychology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506-0044, USA
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0376-6357 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:15518989 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 228
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Zentall, T.R.
Title Imitation: definitions, evidence, and mechanisms Type Journal Article
Year 2006 Publication Animal cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 9 Issue 4 Pages 335-353
Keywords Adaptation, Psychological; Animals; *Behavior, Animal; *Imitative Behavior; *Learning; Motivation; *Social Environment; Transfer (Psychology)
Abstract Imitation can be defined as the copying of behavior. To a biologist, interest in imitation is focused on its adaptive value for the survival of the organism, but to a psychologist, the mechanisms responsible for imitation are the most interesting. For psychologists, the most important cases of imitation are those that involve demonstrated behavior that the imitator cannot see when it performs the behavior (e.g., scratching one's head). Such examples of imitation are sometimes referred to as opaque imitation because they are difficult to account for without positing cognitive mechanisms, such as perspective taking, that most animals have not been acknowledged to have. The present review first identifies various forms of social influence and social learning that do not qualify as opaque imitation, including species-typical mechanisms (e.g., mimicry and contagion), motivational mechanisms (e.g., social facilitation, incentive motivation, transfer of fear), attentional mechanisms (e.g., local enhancement, stimulus enhancement), imprinting, following, observational conditioning, and learning how the environment works (affordance learning). It then presents evidence for different forms of opaque imitation in animals, and identifies characteristics of human imitation that have been proposed to distinguish it from animal imitation. Finally, it examines the role played in opaque imitation by demonstrator reinforcement and observer motivation. Although accounts of imitation have been proposed that vary in their level of analysis from neural to cognitive, at present no theory of imitation appears to be adequate to account for the varied results that have been found.
Address (up) Department of Psychology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506-0044, USA. Zentall@uky.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 1435-9448 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:17024510 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 217
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Zentall, T.R.
Title Mental time travel in animals: a challenging question Type Journal Article
Year 2006 Publication Behavioural processes Abbreviated Journal Behav. Process.
Volume 72 Issue 2 Pages 173-183
Keywords Animals; *Behavior, Animal; Columbidae; Concept Formation; Conditioning, Operant; *Imagination; *Memory; Mental Recall; Planning Techniques; Rats; *Time Perception; Transfer (Psychology)
Abstract Humans have the ability to mentally recreate past events (using episodic memory) and imagine future events (by planning). The best evidence for such mental time travel is personal and thus subjective. For this reason, it is particularly difficult to study such behavior in animals. There is some indirect evidence, however, that animals have both episodic memory and the ability to plan for the future. When unexpectedly asked to do so, animals can report about their recent past experiences (episodic memory) and they also appear to be able to use the anticipation of a future event as the basis for a present action (planning). Thus, the ability to imagine past and future events may not be uniquely human.
Address (up) Department of Psychology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506-0044, USA. zentall@uky.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0376-6357 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:16466863 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 218
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Lacreuse, A.; Martin-Malivel, J.; Lange, H.S.; Herndon, J.G.
Title Effects of the menstrual cycle on looking preferences for faces in female rhesus monkeys Type Journal Article
Year 2007 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 10 Issue 2 Pages 105-115
Keywords Animals; *Behavior, Animal; Discrimination Learning; Estradiol/blood; *Face; Female; Humans; Macaca mulatta/*physiology; Male; Menstrual Cycle/blood/*physiology; *Pattern Recognition, Visual
Abstract Fluctuations of ovarian hormones across the menstrual cycle influence a variety of social and cognitive behaviors in primates. For example, female rhesus monkeys exhibit heightened interest for males and increased agonistic interactions with other females during periods of high estrogen levels. In the present study, we hypothesized that females' preference for males during periods of high estrogen levels is also expressed at the level of face perception. We tested four intact females on two face-tasks involving neutral portraits of male and female rhesus monkeys, chimpanzees and humans. In the visual preference task (VP), monkeys had to touch a button to view a face image. The image remained on the screen as long as the button was touched, and the duration of pressing was taken as an index of the monkey's looking time for the face stimulus. In the Face-Delayed Recognition Span Test (Face-DRST), monkeys were rewarded for touching the new face in an increasing number of serially presented faces. Monkeys were tested 5 days a week across one menstrual cycle. Blood was collected every other day for analysis of estradiol and progesterone. Two of the four females were cycling at the time of testing. We did not find an influence of the cycle on Face-DRST, likely due to a floor effect. In the VP however, the two cycling individuals looked longer at conspecific male faces than female faces during the peri-ovulatory period of the cycle. Such effects were absent for human and chimpanzee faces and for the two noncycling subjects. These data suggest that ovarian hormones may influence females' preferences for specific faces, with heightened preference for male faces during the peri-ovulatory period of the cycle. Heightened interest for stimuli of significant reproductive relevance during periods of high conception risk may help guide social and sexual behavior in the rhesus monkey.
Address (up) Department of Psychology, University of Massachusetts-Amherst, Tobin Hall, 135 Hicks Way, Amherst, MA 01003, USA. alacreuse@psych.umass.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 1435-9448 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:16909232 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2452
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Shettleworth, S.J.
Title Taking the best for learning Type Journal Article
Year 2005 Publication Behavioural processes Abbreviated Journal Behav. Process.
Volume 69 Issue 2 Pages 147-9; author reply 159-63
Keywords *Algorithms; Animals; *Behavior, Animal; Decision Making; Evolution; *Learning; *Models, Theoretical
Abstract Examples of how animals learn when multiple, sometimes redundant, cues are present provide further examples not considered by Hutchinson and Gigerenzer that seem to fit the principle of taking the best. “The best” may the most valid cue in the present circumstances; evolution may also produce species-specific biases to use the most functionally relevant cues.
Address (up) Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ont., Canada M5S 3G3. shettle@psych.utoronto.ca
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0376-6357 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:15845301 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 361
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Helton, W.S.
Title Animal expertise, conscious or not Type Journal Article
Year 2005 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 8 Issue 2 Pages 67-74
Keywords Animals; *Behavior, Animal; *Cognition; *Consciousness; *Learning; Motor Skills; *Practice (Psychology)
Abstract Rossano (Cognition 89:207, 2003) proposes expertise as an indicator of consciousness in humans and other animals. Since there is strong evidence that the development of expertise requires deliberate practice (Ericsson in The road to excellence: the acquisition of expert performance in the arts and sciences, sports and games 1996), and deliberate practice appears to be outside of the bounds of unconscious processing, then any signs of expertise development in an animal are indicators of consciousness. Rossano's argument may lead to an unsolvable debate about animal consciousness while causing researchers to overlook the underlying reality of animal expertise. This article provides evidence indicative of animals meeting each of the three definitions of expertise established in the scientific literature: expertise as a social construction, expertise as exceptional performance, and expertise as knowledge. In addition, cases of deliberate practice by non-human animals are offered. Acknowledging some animals as experts, regardless of consciousness, is warranted by the research findings and would prove useful in solving many issues remaining in the human expertise literature.
Address (up) Department of Psychology, Wilmington College, Wilmington, OH 45177, USA, deak_helton@yahoo.com
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 1435-9448 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:15365876 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2511
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Santos, L.R.; Barnes, J.L.; Mahajan, N.
Title Expectations about numerical events in four lemur species (Eulemur fulvus, Eulemur mongoz, Lemur catta and Varecia rubra) Type Journal Article
Year 2005 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 8 Issue 4 Pages 253-262
Keywords Animals; *Behavior, Animal; Female; Lemuridae/classification/*psychology; Male; *Pattern Recognition, Visual
Abstract Although much is known about how some primates--in particular, monkeys and apes--represent and enumerate different numbers of objects, very little is known about the numerical abilities of prosimian primates. Here, we explore how four lemur species (Eulemur fulvus, E. mongoz, Lemur catta, and Varecia rubra) represent small numbers of objects. Specifically, we presented lemurs with three expectancy violation looking time experiments aimed at exploring their expectations about a simple 1+1 addition event. In these experiments, we presented subjects with displays in which two lemons were sequentially added behind an occluder and then measured subjects' duration of looking to expected and unexpected outcomes. In experiment 1, subjects looked reliably longer at an unexpected outcome of only one object than at an expected outcome of two objects. Similarly, subjects in experiment 2 looked reliably longer at an unexpected outcome of three objects than at an expected outcome of two objects. In experiment 3, subjects looked reliably longer at an unexpected outcome of one object twice the size of the original than at an expected outcome of two objects of the original size. These results suggest that some prosimian primates understand the outcome of simple arithmetic operations. These results are discussed in light of similar findings in human infants and other adult primates.
Address (up) Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520, USA. laurie.santos@yale.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 1435-9448 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:15729569 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2492
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Santos, L.R.; Rosati, A.; Sproul, C.; Spaulding, B.; Hauser, M.D.
Title Means-means-end tool choice in cotton-top tamarins (Saguinus oedipus): finding the limits on primates' knowledge of tools Type Journal Article
Year 2005 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 8 Issue 4 Pages 236-246
Keywords Animals; *Behavior, Animal; *Choice Behavior; Female; Male; *Problem Solving; Saguinus/*psychology
Abstract Most studies of animal tool use require subjects to use one object to gain access to a food reward. In many real world situations, however, animals perform more than one action in sequence to achieve their goals. Of theoretical interest is whether animals have the cognitive capacity to recognize the relationship between consecutive action sequences in which there may be one overall goal and several subgoals. Here we ask if cotton-top tamarins, a species that in captivity uses tools to solve means-end problems, can go one step further and use a sequence of tools (means) to obtain food (end). We first trained subjects to use a pulling tool to obtain a food reward. After this initial training, subjects were presented with problems in which one tool had to be used in combination with a second in order to obtain food. Subjects showed great difficulty when two tools were required to obtain the food reward. Although subjects attended to the connection between the tool and food reward, they ignored the physical connection between the two tools. After training on a two-tool problem, we presented subjects with a series of transfer tests to explore if they would generalize to new types of connections between the tools. Subjects readily transferred to new connections. Our results therefore provide the first evidence to date that tamarins can learn to solve problems involving two tools, but that they do so only with sufficient training.
Address (up) Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA. laurie.santos@yale.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 1435-9448 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:15668762 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2495
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Chase, I.D.; Tovey, C.; Spangler-Martin, D.; Manfredonia, M.
Title Individual differences versus social dynamics in the formation of animal dominance hierarchies Type Journal Article
Year 2002 Publication Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Abbreviated Journal Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.
Volume 99 Issue 8 Pages 5744-5749
Keywords Animals; *Behavior, Animal; Fishes; Humans; *Social Behavior; *Social Dominance
Abstract Linear hierarchies, the classical pecking-order structures, are formed readily in both nature and the laboratory in a great range of species including humans. However, the probability of getting linear structures by chance alone is quite low. In this paper we investigate the two hypotheses that are proposed most often to explain linear hierarchies: they are predetermined by differences in the attributes of animals, or they are produced by the dynamics of social interaction, i.e., they are self-organizing. We evaluate these hypotheses using cichlid fish as model animals, and although differences in attributes play a significant part, we find that social interaction is necessary for high proportions of groups with linear hierarchies. Our results suggest that dominance hierarchy formation is a much richer and more complex phenomenon than previously thought, and we explore the implications of these results for evolutionary biology, the social sciences, and the use of animal models in understanding human social organization.
Address (up) Department of Sociology, State University of New York, Stony Brook, NY 11794-4356, USA. Ichase@notes.cc.sunysb.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0027-8424 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:11960030 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 442
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Aronson, L.
Title Animal behavior case of the month. Aggression directed toward other horses Type Journal Article
Year 1998 Publication Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association Abbreviated Journal J Am Vet Med Assoc
Volume 213 Issue 3 Pages 358-359
Keywords *Aggression; Animals; *Behavior, Animal; Follow-Up Studies; Horse Diseases/*diagnosis/drug therapy/psychology; Horses/*psychology; Housing, Animal; Hypothyroidism/diagnosis/drug therapy/*veterinary; Male; Physical Examination/veterinary; Thyroxine/blood/therapeutic use
Abstract
Address (up) Department of Surgery, School of Veterinary Medicine, Tufts University, North Grafton, MA 01536, USA
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0003-1488 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:9702222 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 1935
Permanent link to this record