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| Author |
Roberts, J.; Kacelnik, A.; Hunter, M.L. |
Title  |
A model of sound interference in relation to acoustic communication |
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Journal Article |
| Year |
1979 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
| Volume |
27 |
Issue |
Part 4 |
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1271-1273 |
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2124 |
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Weir, A.A.S.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
A New Caledonian crow (Corvus moneduloides) creatively re-designs tools by bending or unbending aluminium strips |
Type |
Journal Article |
| Year |
2006 |
Publication |
Animal Cognition |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Cogn. |
| Volume |
9 |
Issue |
4 |
Pages |
317-334 |
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Animals; *Comprehension; *Crows; Female; Learning; *Motor Skills; *Problem Solving; *Tool Use Behavior |
| Abstract |
Previous observations of a New Caledonian crow (Corvus moneduloides) spontaneously bending wire and using it as a hook [Weir et al. (2002) Science 297:981] have prompted questions about the extent to which these animals 'understand' the physical causality involved in how hooks work and how to make them. To approach this issue we examine how the same subject (“Betty”) performed in three experiments with novel material, which needed to be either bent or unbent in order to function to retrieve food. These tasks exclude the possibility of success by repetition of patterns of movement similar to those employed before. Betty quickly developed novel techniques to bend the material, and appropriately modified it on four of five trials when unbending was required. She did not mechanically apply a previously learned set of movements to the new situations, and instead sought new solutions to each problem. However, the details of her behaviour preclude concluding definitely that she understood and planned her actions: in some cases she probed with the unmodified tools before modifying them, or attempted to use the unmodified (unsuitable) end of the tool after modification. Gauging New Caledonian crows' level of understanding is not yet possible, but the observed behaviour is consistent with a partial understanding of physical tasks at a level that exceeds that previously attained by any other non-human subject, including apes. |
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Department of Zoology, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3PS, UK. alex.weir@magdalen.oxon.org |
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English |
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1435-9448 |
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PMID:17024509 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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2436 |
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| Author |
Bateson, M.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
Accuracy of memory for amount in the foraging starling,Sturnus vulgaris |
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Journal Article |
| Year |
1995 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
| Volume |
50 |
Issue |
2 |
Pages |
431-443 |
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Attempts to include psychological constraints in models of foraging behaviour differ in their assumptions concerning the accuracy of estimation of environmental parameters. Psychologists model estimation error as increasing linearly with the magnitude of a stimulus (Weber's Law), whereas behavioural ecologists either ignore error or assume it to be independent of stimulus magnitude. Studies on the estimation of time intervals have confirmed Weber's Law, but there are few data on the accuracy of estimation of amounts of food. Since the currency of most foraging models is the amount of food acquired per unit of time spent foraging, information on estimation of amount is required. Here, a titration method was used in which starlings chose between two cues. One colour signalled a standard food reward, and the other a reward that adjusted in magnitude according to the birds' choices: it increased when the standard was preferred and decreased when the adjusting option was preferred. There were two standards of 3 and 9 units of food, each of which was delivered at two rates to control for possible effects of rate of reinforcement on discrimination. The observed value of the adjusting option oscillated around a mean value slightly larger than that of the standard. The amplitude and period of these oscillations were larger when the standard was larger, independent of the rate of reinforcement. Also, molecular analysis showed that the probability of choosing the currently larger alternative increased as the relative difference between the adjusting option and standard increased. These results are consistent with Weber's Law applying to starlings' memories for amounts of food. |
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2110 |
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Cuthill, I.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
Central place foraging: a reappraisal of the `loading effect' |
Type |
Journal Article |
| Year |
1990 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
| Volume |
40 |
Issue |
6 |
Pages |
1087-1101 |
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Animals that provision a central place usually bring back larger loads when foraging far from home. This positive correlation between average load size and distance is typically explained as rate-maximizing behaviour in the face of a trade-off between travel costs and a decelerating rate of prey gain in food patches (the `loading effect'). By using feeders to provide wild parent starlings, Sturnus vulgaris, with constant rates of prey loading, a positive load-distance correlation was shown to exist in the absence of a loading effect (experiment I). However, in a laboratory simulation where no load was transported (experiment II). the average number of prey eaten in patch visits by self-feeding starlings was invariant with travel distance, so the explanation of the load-distance correlation in experiment I must lie in featues peculiar to central place foraging. Bottlenecks in ingestion by chicks and interruption by visual detection of nest disturbance (experiment III) were rejected as causes of the correlation. Risks of dropping prey in flight appeared low, but the risk of kleptoparasitism received weak support. The travel-load size correlation may be an adaptive response to load transport costs, as return travel times increased with the load size being carried (experiment IV). |
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2116 |
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| Author |
Kacelnik, A.; Marsh, B. |
| Title |
Cost can increase preference in starlings |
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Journal Article |
| Year |
2002 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
| Volume |
63 |
Issue |
2 |
Pages |
245-250 |
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We used European starlings, Sturnus vulgaris, to investigate the relationship between the cost paid to obtain food rewards and preference between stimuli associated with the resulting rewards. In no-choice trials either 16 1-m flights (high effort) or four 1-m flights (low effort) gave access to differently coloured keys. Pecking at these keys resulted in identical food rewards. When subjects were given choices between the coloured keys in choice trials without having paid any effort, the majority preferred the coloured key that was paired with the higher level of work in no-choice trials. We relate our findings to results in animal behaviour, psychology and economics, and give a theoretical account that has implications for phenomena variously recognized as the `sunk cost fallacy' (the tendency to invest more in something after much has already been invested), `work ethics' (valuing an option more as a result of physical effort), `cognitive dissonance' (making mental effort to overlook or re-evaluate information that does not accord with a dominant internal representation) and the `Concorde Fallacy' (the readiness to forego more fitness for something that has been responsible for greater fitness compromise in the past). |
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2107 |
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Kenward, B.; Rutz, C.; Weir, A.A.S.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
Development of tool use in New Caledonian crows: inherited action patterns and social influences |
Type |
Journal Article |
| Year |
2006 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
| Volume |
72 |
Issue |
6 |
Pages |
1329-1343 |
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New Caledonian crows, Corvus moneduloides, are the most advanced avian tool makers and tool users. We previously reported that captive-bred isolated New Caledonian crows spontaneously use twig tools and cut tools out of Pandanus spp. tree leaves, an activity possibly under cultural influence in the wild. However, what aspects of these behaviours are inherited and how they interact with individual and social experience remained unknown. To examine the interaction between inherited traits, individual learning and social transmission, we observed the ontogeny of twig tool use in hand-reared juveniles. Successful food retrieval was preceded by stereotyped object manipulation action patterns that resembled components of the mature behaviour, demonstrating that tool-oriented behaviours in this species are an evolved specialization. However, there was also an effect of social learning: juveniles that had received demonstrations of twig tool use by their human foster parent showed higher levels of handling and insertion of twigs than did their naive counterparts; a choice experiment showed that they preferred to handle objects that they had seen being manipulated by their human foster parent. Our observations are consistent with the hypothesis that individual learning, cultural transmission and creative problem solving all contribute to the acquisition of the tool-oriented behaviours in the wild, but inherited species-typical action patterns have a greater role than has been recognized. |
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2103 |
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Beauchamp, G.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
Effects of the knowledge of partners on learning rates in zebra finches Taeniopygia guttata |
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Journal Article |
| Year |
1991 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
| Volume |
41 |
Issue |
2 |
Pages |
247-253 |
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Many interpretations of the adaptive value of group living involve tranfer of knowledge. However, according to learning theory, being in a pair with a knowledgeable partner can have paradoxical consequences. Obtaining food by following a skilled companion may reduce the ability of naive individuals to learn about clues that signal the occurrence of food. This study examined the relation between learning and following in paris of zebra finches. Knowledgeable partners were trained to obtain food from a computer-controlled dispenser by using the information provided by a signal. For non-knowledgeable partners, the signal was irrelevant and could not be used to predict foraging opportunities. The rate of learning about the signal by naive birds that shared the experience of either knowledgeable or nonknowledgeable tutors was then examined. Naive birds learned more slowly as a result of being in a pair with a knowledgeable than a non-knowledgeable partner. Well-informed mates acted as a reliable cue to predict foraging opportunities, and thus overshadowed the independent signal. The knowledge of a partner influences learning rates in naive individuals, but in the opposite direction to that predicted by earlier accounts of learning in social contexts. |
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2115 |
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Kacelnik, A. |
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Information primacy or preference for familiar foraging techniques? A critique of Inglis & Ferguson |
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Journal Article |
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1987 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
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35 |
Issue |
3 |
Pages |
925-926 |
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2121 |
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Brunner, D.; Kacelnik, A.; Gibbon, J. |
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Memory for inter-reinforcement interval variability and patch departure decisions in the starling,Sturnus vulgaris |
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Journal Article |
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1996 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
| Volume |
51 |
Issue |
5 |
Pages |
1025-1045 |
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An experiment with starlings was conducted to investigate the effect of variability in inter-reinforcement intervals on foraging decisions. The experimental design simulated an environment in which food was distributed in patches. Patches contained zero to four food items which could be collected by pecking at a key. All patches ended with sudden depletion. The time elapsed since the last reinforcement was the only way to detect the depletion of the patch. Once a patch was depleted, a new patch could be reached by completion of a travel requirement of 20 flights between two perches. Key pecks within a patch and the time of the last response in a patch (giving-in time) were recorded. The level of variability in the inter-reinforcement intervals was varied between different conditions. An increase in inter-reinforcement interval variability resulted in a flattening of response rate functions and giving-in time distributions, and in more asymmetry of the response functions, but not of the giving-in time distributions. Two theoretical models of decision making are presented, which differ in the assumptions about memory constraints. In one case, all inter-reinforcement intervals are remembered but in the other, only the intervals with extreme values are remembered. Both models accommodate response rates as a function of trial time, but only the second is compatible with the observed departure decision. Our results are compatible with net rate maximization. |
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2109 |
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Reboreda, J.C.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
On cooperation, tit-for-tat and mirros |
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Journal Article |
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1990 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
| Volume |
40 |
Issue |
6 |
Pages |
1188-1189 |
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2117 |
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