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Author Hanggi, E.B.; Ingersoll, J.F.; Waggoner, T.L.
Title Color vision in horses (Equus caballus): deficiencies identified using a pseudoisochromatic plate test Type Journal Article
Year 2007 Publication Journal of Comparative Psychology Abbreviated Journal J. Comp. Psychol.
Volume 121 Issue 1 Pages 65-72
Keywords Animals; Appetitive Behavior; *Color Perception; Color Perception Tests/veterinary; *Discrimination Learning; Female; Horses/*psychology; Male; Sensitivity and Specificity
Abstract In the past, equine color vision was tested with stimuli composed either of painted cards or photographic slides or through physiological testing using electroretinogram flicker photometry. Some studies produced similar results, but others did not, demonstrating that there was not yet a definitive answer regarding color vision in horses (Equus caballus). In this study, a pseudoisochromatic plate test--which is highly effective in testing color vision both in small children and in adult humans--was used for the first time on a nonhuman animal. Stimuli consisted of different colored dotted circles set against backgrounds of varying dots. The coloration of the circles corresponded to the visual capabilities of different types of color deficiencies (anomalous trichromacy and dichromacy). Four horses were tested on a 2-choice discrimination task. All horses successfully reached criterion for gray circles and demonstration circles. None of the horses were able to discriminate the protan-deutan plate or the individual protan or deutan plates. However, all were able to discriminate the tritan plate. The results suggest that horses are dichromats with color vision capabilities similar to those of humans with red-green color deficiencies.
Address Equine Research Foundation, Aptos, CA 95001, USA. EquiResF@aol.com
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language (up) English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0735-7036 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:17324076 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ ; Equine Behaviour @ team @ room B 3.029 Serial 1972
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Author Gibbs, S.E.B.; Lea, S.E.G.; Jacobs, L.F.
Title Flexible use of spatial cues in the southern flying squirrel (Glaucomys volans) Type Journal Article
Year 2007 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 10 Issue 2 Pages 203-209
Keywords Animals; Male; Orientation; *Sciuridae; *Space Perception; *Spatial Behavior
Abstract Insects, birds, and mammals have been shown capable of encoding spatial information in memory using multiple strategies or frames of reference simultaneously. These strategies include orientation to a goal-specific cue or beacon, to the position of the goal in an array of local landmarks, or to its position in the array of distant landmarks, also known as the global frame of reference. From previous experiments, it appears that birds and mammals that scatter hoard rely primarily on a global frame of reference, but this generalization depends on evidence from only a few species. Here we examined spatial memory in a previously unstudied scatter hoarder, the southern flying squirrel. We dissociated the relative weighting of three potential spatial strategies (beacon, global, or relative array strategy) with three probe tests: transposition of beacon and the rotation or the expansion of the array. The squirrels' choices were consistent with a spatial averaging strategy, where they chose the location dictated by at least two of the three strategies, rather than using a single preferred frame of reference. This adaptive and flexible heuristic has not been previously described in animal orientation studies, yet it may be a common solution to the universal problem of encoding and recalling spatial locations in an ephemeral physical landscape.
Address Department of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-1650, USA
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language (up) 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:17265151 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2422
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Author Fiset, S.; Leblanc, V.
Title Invisible displacement understanding in domestic dogs (Canis familiaris): the role of visual cues in search behavior Type Journal Article
Year 2007 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 10 Issue 2 Pages 211-224
Keywords Animals; Dogs/*physiology; Female; Male; *Space Perception; *Spatial Behavior; *Visual Perception
Abstract Recently, (Collier-Baker E, Davis JM, Suddendorf T (2004) J Comp Psychol 118:421-433) suggested that domestic dogs do not understand invisible displacements. In the present study, we further investigated the hypothesis that the search behavior of domestic dogs in invisible displacements is guided by various visual cues inherent to the task rather than by mental representation of an object's past trajectory. Specifically, we examined the role of the experimenter as a function of the final position of the displacement device in the search behavior of domestic dogs. Visible and invisible displacement problems were administered to dogs (N = 11) under two conditions. In the Visible-experimenter condition, the experimenter was visible whereas in the Concealed-experimenter condition, the experimenter was visibly occluded behind a large rigid barrier. Our data supported the conclusion that dogs do not understand invisible displacements but primarily search as a function of the final position of the displacement device and, to a lesser extent, the position of the experimenter.
Address Secteur Sciences Humaines, Universite de Moncton, Campus d'Edmundston, Edmundston, New-Brunswick, E3V 2S8, Canada. sfiset@umce.ca
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language (up) 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:17165041 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2430
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Author Petruso, E.J.; Fuchs, T.; Bingman, V.P.
Title Time-space learning in homing pigeons (Columba livia): orientation to an artificial light source Type Journal Article
Year 2007 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 10 Issue 2 Pages 181-188
Keywords Animals; Circadian Rhythm; Columbidae/*physiology; Homing Behavior/physiology; Learning/*physiology; *Light; Orientation/*physiology; Space Perception/*physiology; Time Perception/*physiology
Abstract Time-space learning reflects an ability to represent in memory event-stimulus properties together with the place and time of the event; a capacity well developed in birds. Homing pigeons were trained in an indoor octagonal arena to locate one food goal in the morning and a different food goal in the late afternoon. The goals differed with respect to their angular/directional relationship to an artificial light source located outside the arena. Further, the angular difference in reward position approximated the displacement of the sun's azimuth that would occur during the same time period. The experimental birds quickly learned the task, demonstrating the apparent ease with which birds can adopt an artificial light source to discriminate among alternative spatial responses at different times of the day. However, a novel midday probe session following successful learning revealed that the light source was interpreted as a stable landmark and not as a surrogate sun that would support compass orientation. Probe sessions following a phase shift of the light-dark cycle revealed that the mechanism employed to make the temporal discrimination was prevailingly based on an endogenous circadian rhythm and not an interval timing mechanism.
Address Department of Psychology and J.P. Scott Center for Neuroscience, Mind and Behavior Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, OH 43403, USA
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language (up) 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:17160343 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2432
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Author Chiandetti, C.; Regolin, L.; Sovrano, V.A.; Vallortigara, G.
Title Spatial reorientation: the effects of space size on the encoding of landmark and geometry information Type Journal Article
Year 2007 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 10 Issue 2 Pages 159-168
Keywords Animals; Chickens/*physiology; *Feeding Behavior; Male; Orientation/*physiology; Pattern Recognition, Visual/*physiology; *Space Perception
Abstract The effects of the size of the environment on animals' spatial reorientation was investigated. Domestic chicks were trained to find food in a corner of either a small or a large rectangular enclosure. A distinctive panel was located at each of the four corners of the enclosures. After removal of the panels, chicks tested in the small enclosure showed better retention of geometrical information than chicks tested in the large enclosure. In contrast, after changing the enclosure from a rectangular-shaped to a square-shaped one, chicks tested in the large enclosure showed better retention of landmark (panels) information than chicks tested in the small enclosure. No differences in the encoding of the overall arrangement of landmarks were apparent when chicks were tested for generalisation in an enclosure differing from that of training in size together with a transformation (affine transformation) that altered the geometric relations between the target and the shape of the environment. These findings suggest that primacy of geometric or landmark information in reorientation tasks depends on the size of the experimental space, likely reflecting a preferential use of the most reliable source of information available during visual exploration of the environment.
Address Department of Psychology and B.R.A.I.N. Centre for Neuroscience, University of Trieste, Via S. Anastasio 12, 34123, Trieste, Italy. cchiandetti@univ.trieste.it
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language (up) 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:17136416 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2433
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Author Ward, C.; Smuts, B.B.
Title Quantity-based judgments in the domestic dog (Canis lupus familiaris) Type Journal Article
Year 2007 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 10 Issue 1 Pages 71-80
Keywords Animals; *Choice Behavior; Dogs; Female; Food; Male; *Size Perception
Abstract We examined the ability of domestic dogs to choose the larger versus smaller quantity of food in two experiments. In experiment 1, we investigated the ability of 29 dogs (results from 18 dogs were used in the data analysis) to discriminate between two quantities of food presented in eight different combinations. Choices were simultaneously presented and visually available at the time of choice. Overall, subjects chose the larger quantity more often than the smaller quantity, but they found numerically close comparisons more difficult. In experiment 2, we tested two dogs from experiment 1 under three conditions. In condition 1, we used similar methods from experiment 1 and tested the dogs multiple times on the eight combinations from experiment 1 plus one additional combination. In conditions 2 and 3, the food was visually unavailable to the subjects at the time of choice, but in condition 2, food choices were viewed simultaneously before being made visually unavailable, and in condition 3, they were viewed successively. In these last two conditions, and especially in condition 3, the dogs had to keep track of quantities mentally in order to choose optimally. Subjects still chose the larger quantity more often than the smaller quantity when the food was not simultaneously visible at the time of choice. Olfactory cues and inadvertent cuing by the experimenter were excluded as mechanisms for choosing larger quantities. The results suggest that, like apes tested on similar tasks, some dogs can form internal representations and make mental comparisons of quantity.
Address Department of Psychology, University of Michigan, 1012 East Hall, 530 Church Street, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1043, USA. rameses@unich.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language (up) 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:16941158 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2440
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Author Chiesa, A.D.; Pecchia, T.; Tommasi, L.; Vallortigara, G.
Title Multiple landmarks, the encoding of environmental geometry and the spatial logics of a dual brain Type Journal Article
Year 2006 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 9 Issue 4 Pages 281-293
Keywords Animals; Association Learning/*physiology; Chickens; *Cues; Dominance, Cerebral/*physiology; *Environment; Exploratory Behavior/*physiology; Logic; Space Perception/*physiology; Spatial Behavior/physiology
Abstract A series of place learning experiments was carried out in young chicks (Gallus gallus) in order to investigate how the geometry of a landmark array and that of a walled enclosure compete when disoriented animals could rely on both of them to re-orient towards the centre of the enclosure. A square-shaped array (four wooden sticks) was placed in the middle of a square-shaped enclosure, the two structures being concentric. Chicks were trained to ground-scratch to search for food hidden in the centre of the enclosure (and the array). To check for effects of array degradation, one, two, three or all landmarks were removed during test trials. Chicks concentrated their searching activity in the central area of the enclosure, but their accuracy was inversely contingent on the number of landmarks removed; moreover, the landmarks still present within the enclosure appeared to influence the shape of the searching patterns. The reduction in the number of landmarks affected the searching strategy of chicks, suggesting that they had focussed mainly on local cues when landmarks were present within the enclosure. When all the landmarks were removed, chicks searched over a larger area, suggesting an absolute encoding of distances from the local cues and less reliance on the relationships provided by the geometry of the enclosure. Under conditions of monocular vision, chicks tended to rely on different strategies to localize the centre on the basis of the eye (and thus the hemisphere) in use, the left hemisphere attending to details of the environment and the right hemisphere attending to the global shape.
Address Department of Psychology and B.R.A.I.N. Centre for Neuroscience, University of Trieste, via S. Anastasio 12, 34100, Trieste, Italy
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language (up) 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:16941155 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2443
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Author Benard, J.; Stach, S.; Giurfa, M.
Title Categorization of visual stimuli in the honeybee Apis mellifera Type Journal Article
Year 2006 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 9 Issue 4 Pages 257-270
Keywords Animals; Bees/*physiology; Classification; Cognition/*physiology; Discrimination Learning/*physiology; Generalization, Stimulus/physiology; Pattern Recognition, Visual/*physiology; Photic Stimulation; Transfer (Psychology)/*physiology; Visual Perception/*physiology
Abstract Categorization refers to the classification of perceptual input into defined functional groups. We present and discuss evidence suggesting that stimulus categorization can also be found in an invertebrate, the honeybee Apis mellifera, thus underlining the generality across species of this cognitive process. Honeybees show positive transfer of appropriate responding from a trained to a novel set of visual stimuli. Such a transfer was demonstrated for specific isolated features such as symmetry or orientation, but also for assemblies (layouts) of features. Although transfer from training to novel stimuli can be achieved by stimulus generalization of the training stimuli, most of these transfer tests involved clearly distinguishable stimuli for which generalization would be reduced. Though in most cases specific experimental controls such as stimulus balance and discriminability are still required, it seems appropriate to characterize the performance of honeybees as reflecting categorization. Further experiments should address the issue of which categorization theory accounts better for the visual performances of honeybees.
Address Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition Animale (UMR 5169), CNRS – Universite Paul Sabatier, 118 route de Narbonne, 31062, Toulouse cedex 4, France
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language (up) 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:16909238 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2446
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Author Lea, S.E.G.; Goto, K.; Osthaus, B.; Ryan, C.M.E.
Title The logic of the stimulus Type Journal Article
Year 2006 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 9 Issue 4 Pages 247-256
Keywords Animals; Behavior, Animal/*physiology; Cognition/*physiology; Columbidae; Comprehension/physiology; Dogs; Humans; *Logic; Pattern Recognition, Visual/physiology; Perception/*physiology; Problem Solving/*physiology; Species Specificity
Abstract This paper examines the contribution of stimulus processing to animal logics. In the classic functionalist S-O-R view of learning (and cognition), stimuli provide the raw material to which the organism applies its cognitive processes-its logic, which may be taxon-specific. Stimuli may contribute to the logic of the organism's response, and may do so in taxon-specific ways. Firstly, any non-trivial stimulus has an internal organization that may constrain or bias the way that the organism addresses it; since stimuli can only be defined relative to the organism's perceptual apparatus, and this apparatus is taxon-specific, such constraints or biases will often be taxon-specific. Secondly, the representation of a stimulus that the perceptual system builds, and the analysis it makes of this representation, may provide a model for the synthesis and analysis done at a more cognitive level. Such a model is plausible for evolutionary reasons: perceptual analysis was probably perfected before cognitive analysis in the evolutionary history of the vertebrates. Like stimulus-driven analysis, such perceptually modelled cognition may be taxon-specific because of the taxon-specificity of the perceptual apparatus. However, it may also be the case that different taxa are able to free themselves from the stimulus logic, and therefore apply a more abstract logic, to different extents. This thesis is defended with reference to two examples of cases where animals' cognitive logic seems to be isomorphic with perceptual logic, specifically in the case of pigeons' attention to global and local information in visual stimuli, and dogs' failure to comprehend means-end relationships in string-pulling tasks.
Address School of Psychology, Washington Singer Laboratories, University of Exeter, Exeter, EX4 4QG, United Kingdom. s.e.g.lea@exeter.ac.uk
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language (up) 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:16909234 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2450
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Author Neiworth, J.J.; Hassett, J.M.; Sylvester, C.J.
Title Face processing in humans and new world monkeys: the influence of experiential and ecological factors Type Journal Article
Year 2007 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 10 Issue 2 Pages 125-134
Keywords Adolescent; Adult; Animals; Ecology; *Face; Female; Humans; Male; Pan troglodytes/*physiology; Species Specificity; Visual Perception/*physiology
Abstract This study tests whether the face-processing system of humans and a nonhuman primate species share characteristics that would allow for early and quick processing of socially salient stimuli: a sensitivity toward conspecific faces, a sensitivity toward highly practiced face stimuli, and an ability to generalize changes in the face that do not suggest a new identity, such as a face differently oriented. The look rates by adult tamarins and humans toward conspecific and other primate faces were examined to determine if these characteristics are shared. A visual paired comparison (VPC) task presented subjects with either a human face, chimpanzee face, tamarin face, or an object as a sample, and then a pair containing the previous stimulus and a novel stimulus was presented. The stimuli were either presented all in an upright orientation, or all in an inverted orientation. The novel stimulus in the pair was either an orientation change of the same face/object or a new example of the same type of face/object, and the stimuli were shown either in an upright orientation or in an inverted orientation. Preference to novelty scores revealed that humans attended most to novel individual human faces, and this effect decreased significantly if the stimuli were inverted. Tamarins showed preferential looking toward novel orientations of previously seen tamarin faces in the upright orientation, but not in an inverted orientation. Similarly, their preference to look longer at novel tamarin and human faces within the pair was reduced significantly with inverted stimuli. The results confirmed prior findings in humans that novel human faces generate more attention in the upright than in the inverted orientation. The monkeys also attended more to faces of conspecifics, but showed an inversion effect to orientation change in tamarin faces and to identity changes in tamarin and human faces. The results indicate configural processing restricted to particular kinds of primate faces by a New World monkey species, with configural processing influenced by life experience (human faces and tamarin faces) and specialized to process orientation changes specific to conspecific faces.
Address Department of Psychology, Carleton College, Northfield, MN 55057, USA. jneiwort@carleton.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language (up) 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:16909230 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2454
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