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Author Neuringer, A.
Title Reinforced variability in animals and people: implications for adaptive action Type Journal Article
Year 2004 Publication The American Psychologist Abbreviated Journal Am Psychol
Volume 59 Issue 9 Pages 891-906
Keywords Animals; Behavior, Animal; *Choice Behavior; Conditioning, Operant; Creativeness; Discrimination (Psychology); Humans; Memory; Problem Solving; *Reinforcement (Psychology)
Abstract Although reinforcement often leads to repetitive, even stereotyped responding, that is not a necessary outcome. When it depends on variations, reinforcement results in responding that is diverse, novel, indeed unpredictable, with distributions sometimes approaching those of a random process. This article reviews evidence for the powerful and precise control by reinforcement over behavioral variability, evidence obtained from human and animal-model studies, and implications of such control. For example, reinforcement of variability facilitates learning of complex new responses, aids problem solving, and may contribute to creativity. Depression and autism are characterized by abnormally repetitive behaviors, but individuals afflicted with such psychopathologies can learn to vary their behaviors when reinforced for so doing. And reinforced variability may help to solve a basic puzzle concerning the nature of voluntary action.
Address Department of Psychology, Reed College, Portland, OR 97202, USA. allen.neuringer@reed.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 (up) 0003-066X ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:15584823 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 4106
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Author Brosnan, S.F.; de Waal, F.B.M.
Title A concept of value during experimental exchange in brown capuchin monkeys, Cebus apella Type Journal Article
Year 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 (up) 0015-5713 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:15486443 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 170
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Author Amé, J.-M.; Halloy, J.; Rivault, C.; Detrain, C.; Deneubourg, J.L.
Title Collegial decision making based on social amplification leads to optimal group formation Type Journal Article
Year 2006 Publication Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Abbreviated Journal Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.
Volume 103 Issue 15 Pages 5835-5840
Keywords Animals; Blattellidae/*physiology; Choice Behavior; Decision Making; Leadership; *Social Behavior
Abstract Group-living animals are often faced with choosing between one or more alternative resource sites. A central question in such collective decision making includes determining which individuals induce the decision and when. This experimental and theoretical study of shelter selection by cockroach groups demonstrates that choices can emerge through nonlinear interaction dynamics between equal individuals without perfect knowledge or leadership. We identify a simple mechanism whereby a decision is taken on the move with limited information and signaling and without comparison of available opportunities. This mechanism leads to optimal mean benefit for group individuals. Our model points to a generic self-organized collective decision-making process independent of animal species.
Address Service d'Ecologie Sociale CP231, Universite Libre de Bruxelles, Avenue F. D. Roosevelt 50, B-1050 Brussels, Belgium
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Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN (up) 0027-8424 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:16581903 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2042
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Author Griffin, D.R.
Title Animals know more than we used to think Type
Year 2001 Publication Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Abbreviated Journal Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.
Volume 98 Issue 9 Pages 4833-4834
Keywords Animal Communication; Animals; Attention/physiology; Brain/physiology; Choice Behavior/physiology; Cognition/*physiology; Humans; Macaca mulatta/physiology/*psychology; Memory/*physiology; Optic Disk/physiology; Psychological Tests
Abstract
Address
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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 (up) 0027-8424 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:11320232 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2823
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Author Hampton, R.R.
Title Rhesus monkeys know when they remember Type Journal Article
Year 2001 Publication Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Abbreviated Journal Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.
Volume 98 Issue 9 Pages 5359-5362
Keywords Animals; Choice Behavior/physiology; Cognition/*physiology; Cues; Food Preferences/psychology; Macaca mulatta/*physiology/*psychology; Male; Memory/*physiology; Probability; Psychological Tests; Reproducibility of Results; Sensitivity and Specificity
Abstract Humans are consciously aware of some memories and can make verbal reports about these memories. Other memories cannot be brought to consciousness, even though they influence behavior. This conspicuous difference in access to memories is central in taxonomies of human memory systems but has been difficult to document in animal studies, suggesting that some forms of memory may be unique to humans. Here I show that rhesus macaque monkeys can report the presence or absence of memory. Although it is probably impossible to document subjective, conscious properties of memory in nonverbal animals, this result objectively demonstrates an important functional parallel with human conscious memory. Animals able to discern the presence and absence of memory should improve accuracy if allowed to decline memory tests when they have forgotten, and should decline tests most frequently when memory is attenuated experimentally. One of two monkeys examined unequivocally met these criteria under all test conditions, whereas the second monkey met them in all but one case. Probe tests were used to rule out “cueing” by a wide variety of environmental and behavioral stimuli, leaving detection of the absence of memory per se as the most likely mechanism underlying the monkeys' abilities to selectively decline memory tests when they had forgotten.
Address Section on the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, Laboratory of Neuropsychology, National Institute of Mental Health, Building 49, Room 1B-80, Bethesda, MD 20892, USA. robert@ln.nimh.nih.gov
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Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN (up) 0027-8424 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:11274360 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2824
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Author Nyman, S.; Dahlborn, K.
Title Effect of water supply method and flow rate on drinking behavior and fluid balance in horses Type Journal Article
Year 2001 Publication Physiology & Behavior Abbreviated Journal Physiol. Behav.
Volume 73 Issue 1-2 Pages 1-8
Keywords Animals; Choice Behavior/physiology; Drinking Behavior/*physiology; Horses/*physiology; Male; Thirst/physiology; *Water Supply; Water-Electrolyte Balance/*physiology
Abstract This study investigated three methods of water supply on drinking preference and behavior in six Standardbred geldings (2-9 years, 505+/-9 kg). The water sources were buckets (B), pressure valve (PV), and float valve (FV) bowls. In an initial drinking preference test, PV was tested at three flow rates: 3, 8, and 16 l/min (PV3, PV8, and PV16), and FV at 3 l/min (FV3). Water intake was measured in l and presented as the percentage of the total daily water intake from each of two simultaneously presented alternatives. The intake from PV8 was greater than from both PV3 (72+/-11% vs. 28+/-11%) and PV16 (90+/-4% vs. 10+/-4%). All horses showed a strong preference for B, 98+/-1% of the intake compared to 2+/-1% from PV8. Individual variation in the data gave no significant difference in preference between the two automatic bowls. In the second part of the study, drinking behavior and fluid balance were investigated when the horses drank from FV3, PV8, and B for 7 consecutive days in a changeover design. Despite a tendency for an increase in total daily drinking time from FV3, the daily water intake was significantly lower (43+/-3 ml/kg) than from PV8 (54+/-2 ml/kg) and B (58+/-3 ml/kg). Daily net water gain [intake-(fecal+urinary output)] was only 0.5+/-3 ml/kg with FV3, resulting in a negative fluid balance if insensible losses are included. These results show that the water supply method can affect both drinking behavior and fluid balance in the horse.
Address Department of Animal Physiology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Box 7045, S-750 07 Uppsala, Sweden. sara.nyman@djfys.slu.se
Corporate Author Thesis
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ISSN (up) 0031-9384 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:11399288 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 1919
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Author Brosnan, S.F.; de Waal, F.B.M.
Title Responses to a simple barter task in chimpanzees, Pan troglodytes Type Journal Article
Year 2005 Publication Primates Abbreviated Journal Primates
Volume 46 Issue 3 Pages 173-182
Keywords Analysis of Variance; Animals; Choice Behavior/*physiology; Conditioning (Psychology)/physiology; Learning/*physiology; Pan troglodytes/*physiology; Reward; Sex Factors; *Social Behavior; *Token Economy
Abstract Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) frequently participate in social exchange involving multiple goods and services of variable value, yet they have not been tested in a formalized situation to see whether they can barter using multiple tokens and rewards. We set up a simple barter economy with two tokens and two associated rewards and tested chimpanzees on their ability to obtain rewards by returning the matching token in situations in which their access to tokens was unlimited or limited. Chimpanzees easily learned to associate value with the tokens, as expected, and did barter, but followed a simple strategy of favoring the higher-value token, regardless of the reward proffered, instead of a more complex but more effective strategy of returning the token that matched the reward. This response is similar to that shown by capuchin monkeys in our previous study. We speculate that this response, while not ideal, may be sufficient to allow for stability of the social exchange system in these primates, and that the importance of social barter to both species may have led to this convergence of strategies.
Address Living Links, Yerkes National Primate Research Center, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA. sbrosna@emory.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 (up) 0032-8332 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:15824938 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 167
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Author Real, L.A.
Title Animal choice behavior and the evolution of cognitive architecture Type Journal Article
Year 1991 Publication Science (New York, N.Y.) Abbreviated Journal Science
Volume 253 Issue 5023 Pages 980-986
Keywords Animals; Bees/genetics/*physiology; Biomechanics; *Choice Behavior; *Cognition; *Evolution; Mathematics; Models, Genetic; Probability
Abstract Animals process sensory information according to specific computational rules and, subsequently, form representations of their environments that form the basis for decisions and choices. The specific computational rules used by organisms will often be evolutionarily adaptive by generating higher probabilities of survival, reproduction, and resource acquisition. Experiments with enclosed colonies of bumblebees constrained to foraging on artificial flowers suggest that the bumblebee's cognitive architecture is designed to efficiently exploit floral resources from spatially structured environments given limits on memory and the neuronal processing of information. A non-linear relationship between the biomechanics of nectar extraction and rates of net energetic gain by individual bees may account for sensitivities to both the arithmetic mean and variance in reward distributions in flowers. Heuristic rules that lead to efficient resource exploitation may also lead to subjective misperception of likelihoods. Subjective probability formation may then be viewed as a problem in pattern recognition subject to specific sampling schemes and memory constraints.
Address Department of Biology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill 27599-3280
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ISSN (up) 0036-8075 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:1887231 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2846
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Author Zentall, T.R.; Kaiser, D.H.; Clement, T.S.; Weaver, J.E.; Campbell, G.
Title Presence/absence-sample matching by pigeons: divergent retention functions may result from the similarity of behavior during the absence sample and the retention interval Type Journal Article
Year 2000 Publication Journal of experimental psychology. Animal behavior processes Abbreviated Journal J Exp Psychol Anim Behav Process
Volume 26 Issue 3 Pages 294-304
Keywords Analysis of Variance; Animals; *Behavior, Animal; *Choice Behavior; *Columbidae; *Conditioning, Operant; Cues
Abstract Divergent choose-absence retention functions typically found in pigeons following presence/absence-sample matching have been attributed to the development of a single-code/default coding strategy. However, such effects may result from adventitious differential responding to the samples. In Experiment 1, retention functions were divergent only when differential sample responding could serve as the basis for comparison choice. In Experiment 2, when pecking did not occur during the retention interval, a choose-absence bias was found, but when pecking occurred during the retention interval, a choose-presence bias resulted. In Experiment 3, positive transfer was found when a stimulus associated with the absence of pecking replaced the absence sample but not when a stimulus associated with pecking replaced the presence sample. Thus, presence/absence-sample matching may not encourage the development of a single-code/default coding strategy in pigeons.
Address Department of Psychology, University of Kentucky, Lexington 40506, USA. zentall@pop.uky.edu
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Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
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ISSN (up) 0097-7403 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:10913994 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 247
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Author Zentall, T.R.; Sherburne, L.M.
Title Role of differential sample responding in the differential outcomes effect involving delayed matching by pigeons Type Journal Article
Year 1994 Publication Journal of experimental psychology. Animal behavior processes Abbreviated Journal J Exp Psychol Anim Behav Process
Volume 20 Issue 4 Pages 390-401
Keywords Animals; Behavior, Animal; Choice Behavior; *Columbidae; *Discrimination Learning; Feeding Behavior; Task Performance and Analysis
Abstract The role of differential sample responding in the differential outcomes effect was examined. In Experiment 1, we trained pigeons on a one-to-many matching task with differential sample responding required. Differential outcomes were associated with samples and comparisons, with comparisons only, or with neither samples nor comparisons. Slopes of delay functions for trials with pecked versus nonpecked samples suggested use of a single-code-default strategy in the nondifferential-outcomes group but not in the differential-outcomes groups. In Experiment 2, differential sample responding and differential outcomes were manipulated independently. Again, there were significant differences in the relative slopes of the delay functions. Results suggest that differential outcomes exert their effect independently of differential sample responding.
Address Department of Psychology, University of Kentucky, Lexington 40506
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 (up) 0097-7403 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:7964521 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial 257
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