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| Author |
Schuck-Paim, C.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
Rationality in risk-sensitive foraging choices by starlings |
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Journal Article |
Year  |
2002 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
| Volume |
64 |
Issue |
6 |
Pages |
869-879 |
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Normative models of choice usually predict preferences between alternatives by computing their value according to some criterion, then identifying the alternative with greatest value. An important consequence of this procedure is captured in the economic concept of rationality, defined through a number of principles that are necessary for the existence of an ordinal scale of value upon which organisms base their choices. Violations of these principles, such as some recently reported breaches of transitivity and regularity in birds and honeybees, have strong implications for the understanding of decision mechanisms in humans and nonhumans alike. We investigated rationality in risky choice using European starlings, Sturnus vulgaris. Birds had to choose between two or three food sources, each associated with a different variance in delay to reward. In three experiments, starlings were strongly risk prone, showing regular and consistent preferences in binary and trinary choices. Preferences also satisfied weak and strong stochastic transitivity. Our results extend the generality of previous research in risk-sensitive foraging to situations where more than two alternatives are present and suggest that violations of rationality in risk-sensitive choices may be expressed only under restricted sets of conditions. Copyright 2002 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour. Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. |
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2106 |
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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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Chappell, J.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
Tool selectivity in a non-primate, the New Caledonian crow (Corvus moneduloides) |
Type |
Journal Article |
| Year |
2002 |
Publication |
Animal Cognition |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Cogn. |
| Volume |
5 |
Issue |
2 |
Pages |
71-78 |
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Adaptation, Psychological; Animals; *Cognition; Female; *Learning; Male; Perception; *Songbirds |
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We present an experiment showing that New Caledonian crows are able to choose tools of the appropriate size for a novel task, without trial-and-error learning. This species is almost unique amongst all animal species (together with a few primates) in the degree of use and manufacture of polymorphic tools in the wild. However, until now, the flexibility of their tool use has not been tested. Flexibility, including the ability to select an appropriate tool for a task, is considered to be a hallmark of complex cognitive adaptations for tool use. In experiment 1, we tested the ability of two captive birds (one male, one female), to select a stick (from a range of lengths provided) matching the distance to food placed in a horizontal transparent pipe. Both birds chose tools matching the distance to their target significantly more often than would be expected by chance. In experiment 2, we used a similar task, but with the tools placed out of sight of the food pipe, such that the birds had to remember the distance of the food before selecting a tool. The task was completed only by the male, who chose a tool of sufficient length significantly more often than chance but did not show a preference for a matching length. |
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Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford OXI 3PS, UK. jackie.chappell@zoo.ox.ac.uk |
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1435-9448 |
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PMID:12150038 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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2606 |
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Weir, A.A.S.; Chappell, J.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
Shaping of hooks in New Caledonian crows |
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Journal Article |
| Year |
2002 |
Publication |
Science (New York, N.Y.) |
Abbreviated Journal |
Science |
| Volume |
297 |
Issue |
5583 |
Pages |
981 |
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Animals; *Behavior, Animal; *Cognition; Female; Male; Songbirds/*physiology |
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Department of Zoology, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3PS, UK |
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1095-9203 |
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PMID:12169726 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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2842 |
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Chappell, J.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
Selection of tool diameter by New Caledonian crows Corvus moneduloides |
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Journal Article |
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2004 |
Publication |
Animal Cognition |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Cogn. |
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7 |
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2 |
Pages |
121-127 |
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Animals; Behavior, Animal; *Choice Behavior; Discrimination Learning; *Feeding Behavior; Female; Functional Laterality; *Manufactured Materials; *Plant Leaves; *Problem Solving; *Songbirds; Technology |
| Abstract |
One important element of complex and flexible tool use, particularly where tool manufacture is involved, is the ability to select or manufacture appropriate tools anticipating the needs of any given task-an ability that has been rarely tested in non-primates. We examine aspects of this ability in New Caledonian crows-a species known to be extraordinary tool users and manufacturers. In a 2002 study, Chappell and Kacelnik showed that these crows were able to select a tool of the appropriate length for a task among a set of different lengths, and in 2002, Weir, Chappell and Kacelnik showed that New Caledonian crows were able to shape unfamiliar materials to create a usable tool for a specific task. Here we examine their handling of tool diameter. In experiment 1, we show that when facing three loose sticks that were usable as tools, they preferred the thinnest one. When the three sticks were presented so that one was loose and the other two in a bundle, they only disassembled the bundle when their preferred tool was tied. In experiment 2, we show that they manufacture, and modify during use, a tool of a suitable diameter from a tree branch, according to the diameter of the hole through which the tool will have to be inserted. These results add to the developing picture of New Caledonian crows as sophisticated tool users and manufacturers, having an advanced level of folk physics. |
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Department of Zoology, South Parks Road, OX1 3PS, Oxford, UK. jackie.chappell@zoo.ox.ac.uk |
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1435-9448 |
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PMID:15069612 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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2528 |
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Pompilio, L.; Kacelnik, A. |
| Title |
State-dependent learning and suboptimal choice: when starlings prefer long over short delays to food |
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Journal Article |
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2005 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour. |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
| Volume |
70 |
Issue |
3 |
Pages |
571-578 |
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Recent studies have used labels such as `work ethics', `sunk costs' and `state-dependent preferences' for apparent anomalies in animals' choices. They suggest that preference between options relates to the options' history, rather than depending exclusively on the expected payoffs. For instance, European starlings, Sturnus vulgaris, trained to obtain identical food rewards from two sources while in two levels of hunger preferred the food source previously associated with higher hunger, regardless of the birds' state at the time of testing. We extended this experimentally and theoretically by studying starlings choosing between sources that differed not only in history but also in the objective properties (delay until reward) of the payoffs they delivered. Two options (PF and H) were initially presented in single-option sessions when subjects were, respectively, prefed or hungry. While option PF offered a delay until reward of 10 s in all treatments, option H delivered delays of 10, 12.5, 15 and 17.5 s in four treatments. When training was completed, we tested preference between the options. When delays in both options were equal (10 s), the birds strongly preferred H. When delay in H was 17.5 s, the birds were indifferent, with intermediate results for intermediate treatments. Preference was not mediated by disrupted knowledge of the delays. Thus, preferences were driven by past state-dependent gains, rather than by the joint effect of the birds' state at the time of choice and knowledge of the absolute properties of each alternative, as assumed in state-dependent, path-independent models of optimal choice. |
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2104 |
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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 |
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Journal Article |
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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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Weir, A.A.S.; Kacelnik, A. |
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A New Caledonian crow (Corvus moneduloides) creatively re-designs tools by bending or unbending aluminium strips |
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Journal Article |
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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 |
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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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1435-9448 |
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PMID:17024509 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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2436 |
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