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Author Ward, C.; Smuts, B.B. doi  openurl
  Title Quantity-based judgments in the domestic dog (Canis lupus familiaris) Type Journal Article
  Year (down) 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 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  
Permanent link to this record
 

 
Author Naug, D.; Arathi, H.S. doi  openurl
  Title Sampling and decision rules used by honey bees in a foraging arena Type Journal Article
  Year (down) 2007 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.  
  Volume 10 Issue 2 Pages 117-124  
  Keywords Animals; Bees/*physiology; *Choice Behavior; Cooperative Behavior; *Feeding Behavior; Flight, Animal  
  Abstract Animals must continuously choose among various available options to exploit the most profitable resource. They also need to keep themselves updated about the values of all available options, since their relative values can change quickly due to depletion or exploitation by competitors. While the sampling and decision rules by which foragers profitably exploit a flower patch have attracted a great deal of attention in theory and experiments with bumble bees, similar rules for honey bee foragers, which face similar foraging challenges, are not as well studied. By presenting foragers of the honey bee Apis cerana with choice tests in a foraging arena and recording their behavior, we investigate possible sampling and decision rules that the foragers use to choose one option over another and to track other options. We show that a large part of the sampling and decision-making process of a foraging honey bee can be explained by decomposing the choice behavior into dichotomous decision points and incorporating the cost of sampling. The results suggest that a honey bee forager, by using a few simple rules as part of a Bayesian inference process, is able to effectively deal with the complex task of successfully exploiting foraging patches that consist of dynamic and multiple options.  
  Address Department of Biology, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO 80523, USA. dhruba@lamar.colostate.edu  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
  Publisher Place of Publication Editor  
  Language 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:16941157 Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2441  
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Author Herrmann, E.; Melis, A.P.; Tomasello, M. doi  openurl
  Title Apes' use of iconic cues in the object-choice task Type Journal Article
  Year (down) 2006 Publication Animal cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.  
  Volume 9 Issue 2 Pages 118-130  
  Keywords Animal Communication; Animals; *Appetitive Behavior; *Choice Behavior; *Cues; Female; Gorilla gorilla; Male; *Nonverbal Communication; Pan paniscus; Pan troglodytes; Pongo pygmaeus; *Problem Solving; Space Perception; Species Specificity; Statistics, Nonparametric  
  Abstract In previous studies great apes have shown little ability to locate hidden food using a physical marker placed by a human directly on the target location. In this study, we hypothesized that the perceptual similarity between an iconic cue and the hidden reward (baited container) would help apes to infer the location of the food. In the first two experiments, we found that if an iconic cue is given in addition to a spatial/indexical cue – e.g., picture or replica of a banana placed on the target location – apes (chimpanzees, bonobos, orangutans, gorillas) as a group performed above chance. However, we also found in two further experiments that when iconic cues were given on their own without spatial/indexical information (iconic cue held up by human with no diagnostic spatial/indexical information), the apes were back to chance performance. Our overall conclusion is that although iconic information helps apes in the process of searching hidden food, the poor performance found in the last two experiments is due to apes' lack of understanding of the informative (cooperative) communicative intention of the experimenter.  
  Address Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Deutscher Platz 6, 04103 Leipzig, Germany. eherrman@eva.mpg.de  
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  Language English Summary Language Original Title  
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  Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
  ISSN 1435-9448 ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes PMID:16395566 Approved no  
  Call Number Serial 14  
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Author Hill, S.E.; Ryan, M.J. doi  openurl
  Title The role of model female quality in the mate choice copying behaviour of sailfin mollies Type Journal Article
  Year (down) 2006 Publication Biology letters Abbreviated Journal Biol Lett  
  Volume 2 Issue 2 Pages 203-205  
  Keywords Animals; *Choice Behavior; Female; Male; *Mating Preference, Animal; Poecilia/*physiology  
  Abstract Female mate choice copying is a socially mediated mate choice behaviour, in which a male's attractiveness to females increases if he was previously chosen by another female as a mate. Although copying has been demonstrated in numerous species, little is known about the specific benefits it confers to copying females. Here we demonstrate that the mate choice behaviour of female sailfin mollies (Poecilia latipinna) is influenced by the phenotypic quality of model females with whom males are observed consorting. Test females choosing between two males of similar body length were found to significantly increase time spent with previously non-preferred males after having observed them with a relatively high-quality female. Conversely, females were found to significantly decrease time spent with previously preferred males after having observed them with a relatively low-quality female. Female mate choice copying might be maintained by selection based on the heuristic value it provides females choosing between males whose quality differences are not easily distinguishable.  
  Address University of Texas at Austin, Department of Psychology, 1 University Station A8000, Austin, TX 78712, USA. sehill@mail.utexas.edu  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
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  Language English Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
  ISSN 1744-9561 ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes PMID:17148362 Approved no  
  Call Number Serial 1820  
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Author Martin, T.I.; Zentall, T.R. doi  openurl
  Title Post-choice information processing by pigeons Type Journal Article
  Year (down) 2005 Publication Animal cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.  
  Volume 8 Issue 4 Pages 273-278  
  Keywords Animals; *Behavior, Animal; *Choice Behavior; *Columbidae; Discrimination Learning  
  Abstract In a conditional discrimination (matching-to-sample), a sample is followed by two comparison stimuli, one of which is correct, depending on the sample. Evidence from previous research suggests that if the stimulus display is maintained following an incorrect response (the so-called penalty-time procedure), acquisition by pigeons is facilitated. The present research tested the hypothesis that the penalty-time procedure allows the pigeons to review and learn from the maintained stimulus display following an incorrect choice. It did so by including a penalty-time group for which, following an incorrect choice, the sample changed to match the incorrect comparison, thus providing the pigeons with post-choice 'misinformation.' This misinformation group acquired the matching task significantly slower than the standard penalty-time group (that had no change in the sample following an error). Furthermore, acquisition of matching by a control group that received no penalty time fell midway between the other two groups, suggesting that the pigeons did not merely take more care in making choices because of the aversiveness of penalty-time. Thus, it appears that in the acquisition of matching-to-sample, when the stimulus display is maintained following an incorrect choice, the pigeons can review or acquire information from the display. This is the first time that such an effect has been reported for a nonhuman species.  
  Address Department of Psychology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506, USA  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
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  Language 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:15744507 Approved no  
  Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 225  
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Author Uehara, T.; Yokomizo, H.; Iwasa, Y. doi  openurl
  Title Mate-choice copying as Bayesian decision making Type Journal Article
  Year (down) 2005 Publication The American naturalist Abbreviated Journal Am Nat  
  Volume 165 Issue 3 Pages 403-410  
  Keywords Animals; *Bayes Theorem; *Choice Behavior; Female; Male; *Models, Biological; *Sexual Behavior, Animal  
  Abstract Mate-choice copying by females has been reported in fishes (e.g., guppies) and lekking birds. Presumably, females assess males' quality using both information from direct observation of males and information acquired by observing other females' choices. Here, we study mathematically the conditions under which mate-choice copying is advantageous on the basis of Bayesian decision theory. A female may observe the mate choice of another female, called the model female, who has performed an optimal choice based on her own judgment. The conditions required for the focal female to choose the same mate as that chosen by the model female should depend on the male's appearance to her, the reliability of her own judgment of male quality, and the reliability of the model females. When three or more females are involved, the optimal mate choice critically depends on whether multiple model females make decisions independently or they themselves copy the choices of others. If two equally reliable females choose different males, the choice of the second female, made knowing the choice of the first, should have a stronger effect on the choice of the third (focal) female. This “last-choice precedence” should be tested experimentally.  
  Address Department of Biology, Faculty of Sciences, Kyushu University, Fukuoka 812-8581, Japan. uehara@bio-math.biology.kyushu-u.ac.jp  
  Corporate Author Thesis  
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  Language English Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
  ISSN 1537-5323 ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes PMID:15729669 Approved no  
  Call Number Serial 1821  
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Author Santos, L.R.; Rosati, A.; Sproul, C.; Spaulding, B.; Hauser, M.D. doi  openurl
  Title Means-means-end tool choice in cotton-top tamarins (Saguinus oedipus): finding the limits on primates' knowledge of tools Type Journal Article
  Year (down) 2005 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.  
  Volume 8 Issue 4 Pages 236-246  
  Keywords Animals; *Behavior, Animal; *Choice Behavior; Female; Male; *Problem Solving; Saguinus/*psychology  
  Abstract Most studies of animal tool use require subjects to use one object to gain access to a food reward. In many real world situations, however, animals perform more than one action in sequence to achieve their goals. Of theoretical interest is whether animals have the cognitive capacity to recognize the relationship between consecutive action sequences in which there may be one overall goal and several subgoals. Here we ask if cotton-top tamarins, a species that in captivity uses tools to solve means-end problems, can go one step further and use a sequence of tools (means) to obtain food (end). We first trained subjects to use a pulling tool to obtain a food reward. After this initial training, subjects were presented with problems in which one tool had to be used in combination with a second in order to obtain food. Subjects showed great difficulty when two tools were required to obtain the food reward. Although subjects attended to the connection between the tool and food reward, they ignored the physical connection between the two tools. After training on a two-tool problem, we presented subjects with a series of transfer tests to explore if they would generalize to new types of connections between the tools. Subjects readily transferred to new connections. Our results therefore provide the first evidence to date that tamarins can learn to solve problems involving two tools, but that they do so only with sufficient training.  
  Address Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA. laurie.santos@yale.edu  
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  Language English Summary Language Original Title  
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  Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
  ISSN 1435-9448 ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes PMID:15668762 Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2495  
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Author Barth, J.; Reaux, J.E.; Povinelli, D.J. doi  openurl
  Title Chimpanzees' (Pan troglodytes) use of gaze cues in object-choice tasks: different methods yield different results Type Journal Article
  Year (down) 2005 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.  
  Volume 8 Issue 2 Pages 84-92  
  Keywords Animals; *Attention; *Choice Behavior; *Cues; *Eye Movements; Female; Male; *Nonverbal Communication; Orientation; Pan troglodytes/*psychology; Social Environment  
  Abstract To assess the influence of different procedures on chimpanzees' performance in object-choice tasks, five adult chimpanzees were tested using three experimenter-given cues to food location: gazing, glancing, and pointing. These cues were delivered to the subjects in an identical fashion but were deployed within the context of two distinct meta-procedures that have been previously employed with this species with conflicting results. In one procedure, the subjects entered the test unit and approached the experimenter (who had already established the cue) on each trial. In the other procedure, the subjects stayed in the test unit throughout a session, witnessed the hiding procedure, and waited for a delay of 10 s during which the cue was provided. The subjects scored at high levels far exceeding chance in response to the gaze cue only when they approached the experimenter for each trial. They performed at chance levels when they stayed inside the test unit throughout the session. They scored at chance levels on all other cues irrespective of the procedure. These findings imply that (a) chimpanzees can immediately exploit social gaze cues, and (b) previous conflicting findings were likely due to the different meta-procedures that were used.  
  Address Department of Neurocognition, Faculty of Psychology, Universiteit Maastricht, P.O. Box 616, 6200 MD, Maastricht, The Netherlands. j.barth@psychology.unimaas.nl  
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  Language 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:15449100 Approved no  
  Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2510  
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Author Brosnan, S.F.; de Waal, F.B.M. doi  openurl
  Title A concept of value during experimental exchange in brown capuchin monkeys, Cebus apella Type Journal Article
  Year (down) 2004 Publication Folia primatologica; international journal of primatology Abbreviated Journal Folia Primatol (Basel)  
  Volume 75 Issue 5 Pages 317-330  
  Keywords Animals; Cebus/*psychology; *Choice Behavior; Female; Food Preferences; *Learning; Male; Sex Factors; Statistics, Nonparametric; *Token Economy; Video Recording  
  Abstract We evaluated the response of brown capuchin monkeys to two differentially valued tokens in an experimental exchange situation akin to a simple barter. Monkeys were given a series of three tests to evaluate their ability to associate tokens with food, then their responses were examined in a barter situation in which tokens were either limited or unlimited. Capuchins did not perform barter in the typical sense, returning the tokens which were associated with the reward. However, females, but not males, showed a different response, preferring the higher-value token. This may indicate that they learned to prefer one token over the other rather than to associate the tokens with their specific rewards. This sex difference parallels previous findings of greater reciprocity in female brown capuchins than in males.  
  Address Living Links Center, Emory University, Yerkes National Primate Research Center, 954 N. Gatewood Drive, Atlanta, GA 30329, USA. sbrosna@emory.edu  
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  Language English Summary Language Original Title  
  Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title  
  Series Volume Series Issue Edition  
  ISSN 0015-5713 ISBN Medium  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes PMID:15486443 Approved no  
  Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 170  
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Author Brosnan, S.F.; de Waal, F.B.M. doi  openurl
  Title Socially learned preferences for differentially rewarded tokens in the brown capuchin monkey (Cebus apella) Type Journal Article
  Year (down) 2004 Publication Journal of comparative psychology (Washington, D.C. : 1983) Abbreviated Journal J Comp Psychol  
  Volume 118 Issue 2 Pages 133-139  
  Keywords Animals; Behavior, Animal; Cebus; *Choice Behavior; Female; *Learning; Male; *Reward; *Social Behavior  
  Abstract Social learning is assumed to underlie traditions, yet evidence indicating social learning in capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella), which exhibit traditions, is sparse. The authors tested capuchins for their ability to learn the value of novel tokens using a previously familiar token-exchange economy. Capuchins change their preferences in favor of a token worth a high-value food reward after watching a conspecific model exchange 2 differentially rewarded tokens, yet they fail to develop a similar preference after watching tokens paired with foods in the absence of a conspecific model. They also fail to learn that the value of familiar tokens has changed. Information about token value is available in all situations, but capuchins seem to pay more attention in a social situation involving novel tokens.  
  Address Living Links Center, Yerkes National Primate Research Center, and Graduate Division of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30329, USA. sbrosna@emory.edu  
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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  
  Area Expedition Conference  
  Notes PMID:15250800 Approved no  
  Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 173  
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