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Author Shettleworth, S.J.
Title Animal cognition and animal behaviour Type Journal Article
Year 2001 Publication Animal Behaviour. Abbreviated Journal Anim. Behav.
Volume 61 Issue 2 Pages 277-286
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Abstract Cognitive processes such as perception, learning, memory and decision making play an important role in mate choice, foraging and many other behaviours. In this review, I summarize a few key ideas about animal cognition developed in a recent book (Shettleworth 1998, Cognition, Evolution and Behaviour) and briefly review some areas in which interdisciplinary research on animal cognition is currently proving especially productive. Cognition, broadly defined, includes all ways in which animals take in information through the senses, process, retain and decide to act on it. Studying animal cognition does not entail any particular position on whether or to what degree animals are conscious. Neither does it entail rejecting behaviourism in that one of the greatest challenges in studing animal cognition is to formulate clear behavioural criteria for inferring specific mental processes. Tests of whether or not apparently goal-directed behaviour is controlled by a representation of its goal, episodic-like memory in birds, and deceptive behaviour in monkeys provide examples. Functional modelling has been integrated with analyses of cognitive mechanisms in a number of areas, including studies of communication, models of how predator learning and attention affect the evolution of conspicuous and cryptic prey, tests of the relationship betweeen ecological demands on spatial cognition and brain evolution, and in research on social learning. Rather than a `new field' of cognitive ecology, such interdisciplinary research on animal cognition exemplifies a revival of interest in proximate mechanisms of behaviour.
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Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 397
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Author Shettleworth, S.J.
Title Cognition, Evolution and Behaviour Type Book Whole
Year 1998 Publication Abbreviated Journal
Volume Issue Pages
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Abstract Description

How do animals perceive the world, learn, remember, search for food or mates, and find their way around? Do any non-human animals count, imitate one another, use a language, or think as we do? What use is cognition in nature and how might it have evolved? Historically, research on such questions has been fragmented between psychology, where the emphasis has been on theoretical models and lab experiments, and biology, where studies focus on evolution and the adaptive use of perception, learning, and decision-making in the field.

Cognition, Evolution and the Study of Behavior integrates research from psychology, behavioral ecology, and ethology in a wide-ranging synthesis of theory and research about animal cognition in the broadest sense, from species-specific adaptations in fish to cognitive mapping in rats and honeybees to theories of mind for chimpanzees. As a major contribution to the emerging discipline of comparative cognition, the book is an invaluable resource for all students and researchers in psychology, zoology, behavioral neuroscience. It will also interest general readers curious about the details of how and why animals--including humans--process, retain, and use information as they do.

Reviews

“This book is a very comprehensive review of animal cognition. It differs from other texts on this topic in a number of ways, as outlined by Shettleworth in her preface and in the opening chapter. Essentially, Shettleworth wants to advocate an 'adaptationist or ecological approach to cognition'. In doing so, she brings together a wealth of data on animal cognition, studied from quite different theoretical viewpoints, such as cognitive ethology, animal learning theory, neuroscience, behavioural ecology and cognitive psychology. . . . Each chapter ends with a clear and useful summary, and helpful suggestions for further reading. The book's numerous illustrations, which are mostly tables or figures redrawn by Margaret Nelson, greatly add to its appeal. . . . [T]his is a marvellously rich, well-written and stimulating book. . . . I greatly enjoyed reading [and] recommend it highly to anyone interested in animal cognition, evolution and behaviour.”--Animal Behaviour

“Sara Shettleworth has probably written the most comprehensive study of the animal mind ever and therefore a fundamental textbook on 'comparative cognition'. She first gets consciousness out of the way: whether an animal is conscious or not is impossible to determine, since consciousness is a private, subjective phenomenon. We can study cognition, and certainly cognition lends credibility to the idea that at least some animals must be at least to some degree conscious, but experiments can only prove facts about cognition. She reviews the field of cognitive ethology from the beginning and then analyzes the main cognitive tasks from an information-processing perspective By the end of her review of cognitive faculties, it become apparent that, at least among vertebrates, there are no significant differences in learning, except for language. All vertebrates are capable of 'associative' learning What no other vertebrate seems to be capable of is 'syntax'.” -- Piero Scaruffi, Thymos.com
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Publisher Oxford University Press Place of Publication Oxford Editor
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ISSN ISBN 9780195110487 Medium
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Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 4712
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Author Shettleworth, S.J.
Title The evolution of comparative cognition: is the snark still a Boojum? Type Journal Article
Year 2009 Publication Behav Processes Abbreviated Journal
Volume 80 Issue Pages
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Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Shettleworth2009 Serial 6231
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Author Shettleworth, S.J.
Title Cognitive ecology: field or label? Type Journal Article
Year 2000 Publication Trends in Ecology & Evolution Abbreviated Journal Trends. Ecol. Evol
Volume 15 Issue 4 Pages 161
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Address Depts of Psychology and Zoology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5S 3G3
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Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0169-5347 ISBN Medium
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Notes (up) PMID:10717686 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 373
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Author Gibson, B.M.; Shettleworth, S.J.; McDonald, R.J.
Title Finding a goal on dry land and in the water: differential effects of disorientation on spatial learning Type Journal Article
Year 2001 Publication Behavioural brain research Abbreviated Journal Behav. Brain. Res.
Volume 123 Issue 1 Pages 103-111
Keywords Animals; Cues; Environment; Male; Maze Learning/*physiology; Orientation/*physiology; Rats; Rats, Long-Evans; Spatial Behavior/*physiology; Water
Abstract Two previous studies, Martin et al. (J. Exp. Psychol. Anim. Behav. Process. 23 (1997) 183) and Dudchenko et al. (J. Exp. Psychol. Anim. Behav. Process. 23 (1997) 194), report that, compared to non-disoriented controls, rats disoriented before testing were disrupted in their ability to learn the location of a goal on a dry radial-arm maze task, but that both groups learned at the same rate in the Morris water maze. However, the radial-arm maze task was much more difficult than the water maze. In the current set of experiments, we examined the performance of control and disoriented rats on more comparable dry land and water maze tasks. Compared to non-disoriented rats, rats that were disoriented before testing were significantly impaired in locating a goal in a circular dry arena, but not a water tank. The results constrain theoretical explanations for the differential effects of disorientation on different spatial tasks.
Address Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, 100 St. George Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5S 3G3. gibson@psych.utoronto.ca
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Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0166-4328 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes (up) PMID:11377733 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 372
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Author Hampton, R.R.; Healy, S.D.; Shettleworth, S.J.; Kamil, A.C.
Title Neuroecologists' are not made of straw Type Journal Article
Year 2002 Publication Trends in Cognitive Sciences Abbreviated Journal Trends. Cognit. Sci.
Volume 6 Issue 1 Pages 6-7
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Address Laboratory of Neuropsychology, NIH--NIMH, Building 49, Room 1B-80, 20892-4415, Bethesda, MD, USA
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Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 1364-6613 ISBN Medium
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Notes (up) PMID:11849608 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 371
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Author Shettleworth, S.J.; Westwood, R.P.
Title Divided attention, memory, and spatial discrimination in food-storing and nonstoring birds, black-capped chickadees (Poecile atricapilla) and dark-eyed juncos (Junco hyemalis) Type Journal Article
Year 2002 Publication Journal of experimental psychology. Animal behavior processes Abbreviated Journal J Exp Psychol Anim Behav Process
Volume 28 Issue 3 Pages 227-241
Keywords Animals; Attention/*physiology; Behavior, Animal/physiology; Birds; *Discrimination (Psychology); *Food Habits; Memory/*physiology; Space Perception/*physiology; Spatial Behavior/*physiology
Abstract Food-storing birds, black-capped chickadees (Poecile atricapilla), and nonstoring birds, dark-eyed juncos (Junco hyemalis), matched color or location on a touch screen. Both species showed a divided attention effect for color but not for location (Experiment 1). Chickadees performed better on location than on color with retention intervals up to 40 s, but juncos did not (Experiment 2). Increasing sample-distractor distance improved performance similarly in both species. Multidimensional scaling revealed that both use a Euclidean metric of spatial similarity (Experiment 3). When choosing between the location and color of a remembered item, food storers choose location more than do nonstorers. These results explain this effect by differences in memory for location relative to color, not division of attention or spatial discrimination ability.
Address Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, 100 Saint George Street, Toronto, Ontario M5S 3G3, Canada. shettle@psych.utoronto.ca
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Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0097-7403 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes (up) PMID:12136700 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 370
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Author Jones, J.E.; Antoniadis, E.; Shettleworth, S.J.; Kamil, A.C.
Title A comparative study of geometric rule learning by nutcrackers (Nucifraga columbiana), pigeons (Columba livia), and jackdaws (Corvus monedula) Type Journal Article
Year 2002 Publication Journal of comparative psychology (Washington, D.C. : 1983) Abbreviated Journal J Comp Psychol
Volume 116 Issue 4 Pages 350-356
Keywords Animals; Behavior, Animal/physiology; Birds; Feeding Behavior/physiology; Learning/*physiology; *Mathematics; Random Allocation; Spatial Behavior/*physiology
Abstract Three avian species, a seed-caching corvid (Clark's nutcrackers; Nucifraga columbiana), a non-seed-caching corvid (jackdaws; Corvus monedula), and a non-seed-caching columbid (pigeons; Columba livia), were tested for ability to learn to find a goal halfway between 2 landmarks when distance between the landmarks varied during training. All 3 species learned, but jackdaws took much longer than either pigeons or nutcrackers. The nutcrackers searched more accurately than either pigeons or jackdaws. Both nutcrackers and pigeons showed good transfer to novel landmark arrays in which interlandmark distances were novel, but inconclusive results were obtained from jackdaws. Species differences in this spatial task appear quantitative rather than qualitative and are associated with differences in natural history rather than phylogeny.
Address School of Biological Sciences, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 68588-0118, USA
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Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0735-7036 ISBN Medium
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Notes (up) PMID:12539930 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 369
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Author Gibson, B.M.; Shettleworth, S.J.
Title Competition among spatial cues in a naturalistic food-carrying task Type Journal Article
Year 2003 Publication Learning & behavior : a Psychonomic Society publication Abbreviated Journal Learn Behav
Volume 31 Issue 2 Pages 143-159
Keywords Adaptation, Psychological; Animals; Appetitive Behavior; *Association Learning; *Attention; Choice Behavior; *Cues; *Discrimination Learning; Male; Rats; Rats, Long-Evans; Space Perception; *Spatial Behavior
Abstract Rats collected nuts from a container in a large arena in four experiments testing how learning about a beacon or cue at a goal interacts with learning about other spatial cues (place learning). Place learning was quick, with little evidence of competition from the beacon (Experiments 1 and 2). Rats trained to approach a beacon regardless of its location were subsequently impaired when the well-learned beacon was removed and other spatial cues identified the location of the goal (Experiment 3). The competition between beacon and place cues reflected learned irrelevance for place cues (Experiment 4). The findings differ from those of some studies of associative interactions between cue and place learning in other paradigms.
Address University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 1543-4494 ISBN Medium
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Notes (up) PMID:12882373 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 368
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Author Shettleworth, S.J.
Title Memory and hippocampal specialization in food-storing birds: challenges for research on comparative cognition Type Journal Article
Year 2003 Publication Brain, behavior and evolution Abbreviated Journal Brain Behav Evol
Volume 62 Issue 2 Pages 108-116
Keywords Animals; Birds/*physiology; Cognition/*physiology; Color Perception/physiology; Feeding Behavior/*physiology; Hippocampus/*physiology; Memory/*physiology; Species Specificity
Abstract The three-way association among food-storing behavior, spatial memory, and hippocampal enlargement in some species of birds is widely cited as an example of a new 'cognitive ecology' or 'neuroecology.' Whether this relationship is as strong as it first appears and whether it might be evidence for an adaptive specialization of memory and hippocampus in food-storers have recently been the subject of some controversy [Bolhuis and Macphail, 2001; Macphail and Bolhuis, 2001]. These critiques are based on misconceptions about the nature of adaptive specializations in cognition, misconceptions about the uniformity of results to be expected from applying the comparative method to data from a wide range of species, and a narrow view of what kinds of cognitive adaptations are theoretically interesting. New analyses of why food-storers (black-capped chickadees, Poecile Atricapilla) respond preferentially to spatial over color cues when both are relevant in a memory task show that this reflects a relative superiority of spatial memory as compared to memory for color rather than exceptional spatial attention or spatial discrimination ability. New studies of chickadees from more or less harsh winter climates also support the adaptive specialization hypothesis and suggest that within-species comparisons may be especially valuable for unraveling details of the relationships among ecology, memory, and brain in food-storing species.
Address Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ont., M5S 3G3, Canada. shettle@psych.utoronto.ca
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ISSN 0006-8977 ISBN Medium
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Notes (up) PMID:12937349 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 367
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