Abstract: Numerous investigators have argued that early ontogenetic immersion in sociocultural environments facilitates cognitive developmental change in human-reared great apes more characteristic of Homo sapiens than of their own species. Such revamping of core, species-typical psychological systems might be manifest, according to this argument, in the emergence of mental representational competencies, a set of social cognitive skills theoretically consigned to humans alone. Human-reared great apes' capacity to engage in “true imitation,” in which both the means and ends of demonstrated actions are reproduced with fairly high rates of fidelity, and laboratory great apes' failure to do so, has frequently been interpreted as reflecting an emergent understanding of intentionality in the former. Although this epigenetic model of the effects of enculturation on social cognitive systems may be well-founded and theoretically justified in the biological literature, alternative models stressing behavioral as opposed to representational change have been largely overlooked. Here I review some of the controversy surrounding enculturation in great apes, and present an alternative nonmentalistic version of the enculturation hypothesis that can also account for enhanced imitative performance on object-oriented problem-solving tasks in human-reared animals.

Abstract: A previous study demonstrated that horses can learn socially from observing humans, but could not draw any conclusions about the social learning mechanisms. Here we develop this by showing horses four different human action sequences as demonstrations of how to press a button to open a feed box. We tested 68 horses aged between 3 and 12 years. 63 horses passed the habituation phase and were assigned either to the group Hand Demo (N = 13) for which a kneeling person used a hand to press the button, Head Demo (N = 13) for which a kneeling person used the head, Mixed Demo (N = 12) for which a squatting person used both head and hand, Foot Demo (N = 12) in which a standing person used a foot, or No Demo (N = 13) in which horses did not receive a demonstration. 44 horses reached the learning criterion of opening the feeder twenty times consecutively, 40 of these were 75% of the Demo group horses and four horses were 31% of the No Demo group horses. Horses not reaching the learning criterion approached the human experimenters more often than those who did. Significantly more horses used their head to press the button no matter which demonstration they received. However, in the Foot Demo group four horses consistently preferred to use a hoof and two switched between hoof and head use. After the Mixed Demo the horses' actions were more diverse. The results indicate that only a few horses copy behaviours when learning socially from humans. A few may learn through observational conditioning, as some appeared to adapt to demonstrated actions in the course of reaching the learning criterion. Most horses learn socially through enhancement, using humans to learn where, and which aspect of a mechanism has to be manipulated, and by applying individual trial and error learning to reach their goal.

Abstract: Dominance relationships in primate societies are generally inferred by analyses of agonistic interactions. This aspect of social organization is so striking in macaque and baboon societies that many theoreticians have postulated selective mechanisms operating on the genetic attributes which contribute to high dominance rank. Alpha males were hypothesized to increase their genetic fitness by successfully competing with other males for access to ovulating females. Evidence relevant to these speculations has been mixed. Whereas some investigators found alpha males had near exclusive sexual access to females, others failed to confirm preferential access to ovulating females. Indeed, considerable variability in competition for females existed not only among species, but also among troops of the same species living in different habitats. Further, partner selection was not an exclusive male prerogative; females proved to express active preferences for particular males as sexual partners, and these preferences were not related to high male aggressivity. Alpha males, however, were noted to maintain their positions through social skills as members of a central core or alliance, and high rank was related primarily to seniority. Moreover, alpha males responded actively to challenges to the troop and were judged to contribute significantly to the survival of infants. It was therefore hypothesized that increased genetic fitness related to the increased survival of immature animals in the troop, most of which would already be the offspring of senior (and hence alpha) males. Selection would then be for the social skills leading to successful alliances in troop defense. Such skills might also relate to female partner preferences thus increasing the reproductive effectiveness of alpha males at any point in their careers, including years prior to and following their assumption of alpha rank.