|
|
Baragli, P., Cozzi, A., Rugani, R., Sighieria, C., & Regolin, L. (2008). Delayed search for non-social goals by Equids (Equus caballus and Equus asinus). In IESM 2008.
Abstract: Delayed-responses have been traditionally employed to investigate the temporal characteristics of animals“ ability to represent and recall objects that have disappeared. In the typical condition, the animal, usually a mammal, observes the experimenter hiding an interesting goal (e.g. some food) in a certain location. A delayed-response task (DRT) was administered to 4 female Esperia pony (2 years old) coming from a free-range breed (Frosinone, Italy) and to 7 female Amiata donkeys (4.2±2 years old) coming from a conservation stock (University of Pisa, Italy). The DRT's apparatus was located in a square fence. A single ”U-shaped“ screen (330x160x140 cm) made by wood shavings blocks was positioned in the centre of the fence. A gap (40x50 cm) on the ground was in the middle of the central side of the U-shaped-screen and served to make the food-attractor disappear. The food-attractor consisted in cereal flakes and fresh grass for ponies and cereal flakes for donkeys. A bucket full of food was placed on a dolly tied on a rope which could be pulled by an experimenter. In a preliminary training each animal was allowed to eat food from the bucket and, while the animal was eating, the dolly was gently pulled away from the animal, and beyond the screen through the gap. The subjects needed to move around of the screen in order to retrieve the food. As a reinforcement, they were allowed to eat some food from the bucket once behind the screen. From trial to trial, the bucket was presented farther and farther (starting with a distance of 1 m in front of the screen to reach 7 m). Therefore subjects were tested in the DRT requiring them to rejoin the bucket with the goal-food disappearing behind the screen as in the preliminary training but following a 10 s delay. For the DRT, the bucket was placed 7 m in front of the screen, 3 m away from the animal's starting area. Then the dolly was pulled away from the animal. Ten seconds after the disappearance of the dolly behind the screen the animal was released from the starting area. The DRT ended when the subject had reached the attractor behind the screen on 3 consecutive trials. Results showed that all animals were able to rejoin the food behind the screen after 10 s delay. The mean time of the delayed-response (mean±sd, in s) in the ponies (1st: 19.8±8; 2nd: 10.8±2.2; 3rd: 12.8±2.8) and in the donkeys (1st: 28.4±10; 2nd: 26.9±13; 3rd: 24.3±16.6) showed a trend to decrease from first trial to third. These preliminary results suggest that like other mammals our ponies and donkeys can maintain a working memory trace of the location where biologically attractive objects have been seen to disappear. In conclusion, this study paves the way to set up a viable model system for the investigation of the more sophisticated aspects of Equids” cognitive abilities such as working memory.
|
|
|
|
Barton, M. D., & Hughes, K. L. (1984). Ecology of Rhodococcus equi. Vet Microbiol, 9(1), 65–76.
Abstract: A selective broth enrichment technique was used to study the distribution of Rhodococcus equi in soil and grazing animals. Rhodococcus equi was isolated from 54% of soils examined and from the gut contents, rectal faeces and dung of all grazing herbivorous species examined. Rhodococcus equi was not isolated from the faeces or dung of penned animals which did not have access to grazing. The isolation rate from dung was much higher than from other samples and this was found to be due to the ability of R. equi to multiply more readily in dung. Delayed hypersensitivity tests were carried out on horses, sheep and cattle, but only horses reacted significantly. The physiological characteristics of R. equi and the nature of its distribution in the environment suggested that R. equi is a soil organism.
|
|
|
|
Byrne, T., Sutphin, G., & Poling, A. (1998). Acquisition, extinction, and reacquisition of responding with delayed and immediate reinforcement. Behav. Process., 43(1), 97–101.
Abstract: The present study investigated acquisition, extinction, and reacquisition of free-operant responding when rats' lever presses produced water after a resetting delay of 0, 10, 20, or 30 s. Results indicated that: (1) responding was acquired rapidly at all delays without shaping or autoshaping; (2) resistance to extinction was directly related to delay length and inversely related to intermittency of reinforcement; (3) responding acquired with delayed reinforcement recovered less rapidly from extinction, and was less efficient, than responding acquired with immediate reinforcement. Comparing these results with those of studies using discrete-trials and free-operant procedures with no reinforcement delay suggest that the specific conditions under which behavior is maintained determines, in part, the behavioral effects of delay and intermittency of reinforcement.
|
|
|
|
h:, M., Lévy, F., Fortin, M., Leterrier, C., & LansadLansade, L. (2013). Stress and temperament affect working memory performance for disappearing food in horses, Equus caballus. Animal Behaviour, 86(6), 1233–1240.
Abstract: In the present study, we sought to determine the influence of stress and temperament on working memory for disappearing food in horses. After assessment of five dimensions of temperament, we tested working memory of horses using a delayed-response task requiring a choice between two food locations. Delays ranging from 0 to 20 s were tested. The duration of working memory for disappearing food was first characterized without stressors (N = 26). The horses were then divided into two groups and their performance was assessed under stressful (exposure to acute stressors prior to testing, N = 12) or control conditions (N = 12). Results showed that the duration of working memory for disappearing food lasted at least 20 s under nonstressful conditions, and that under stressful conditions this duration lasted less than 12 s. This stress-induced impairment confirms in a nonrodent species that working memory performance is very sensitive to exposure to stressors. In addition, working memory performance in horses is influenced by the temperamental dimension of fearfulness according to the state of stress: fearful horses showed better performance under control conditions and worse performance under stressful conditions than nonfearful horses. These findings are discussed in the context of the Yerkes–Dodson law of stress and performance.
|
|
|
|
McLean, A. N. (2004). Short-term spatial memory in the domestic horse. Appl. Anim. Behav. Sci., 85(1-2), 93–105.
Abstract: This study investigates the ability of horses to recall a feeding event in a two-point choice apparatus. Twelve horses were individually tested whereby they were maintained immobile in a test arena and visually and aurally experienced the delivery of food into one of two feed goals. The horses were then released to make their choice in two experimental contexts: immediate release after experiencing the delivery of food, and release 10 s after food delivery. Each horse performed 40 immediate-release (IR) trials, followed by forty 10-s release trials over a 3-day period. In addition, the same horses were tested 3 months later in the spring with the same number and sequence of trials. Results were analysed by log-linear analysis of frequencies. Results showed that while horses were able to achieve the correct feed goal choice in the immediate-release trials, they were unsuccessful with the 10-s release trials. This suggests that there are limitations in recall abilities in horses, in that they may not possess a prospective type of memory. There are welfare and training implications in these findings concerning the effects of overestimating the mental abilities of horses during training and the effects of delays in reinforcements.
|
|
|
|
Pelé, M., & Sueur, C. (2013). Decision-making theories: linking the disparate research areas of individual and collective cognition. Animal Cognition, 16(4), 543–556.
Abstract: In order to maximize their fitness, animals have to deal with different environmental and social factors that affect their everyday life. Although the way an animal behaves might enhance its fitness or survival in regard to one factor, it could compromise them regarding another. In the domain of decision sciences, research concerning decision making focuses on performances at the individual level but also at the collective one. However, between individual and collective decision making, different terms are used resulting in little or no connection between both research areas. In this paper, we reviewed how different branches of decision sciences study the same concept, mainly called speed-accuracy trade-off, and how the different results are on the same track in terms of showing the optimality of decisions. Whatever the level, individual or collective, each decision might be defined with three parameters: time or delay to decide, risk and accuracy. We strongly believe that more progress would be possible in this domain of research if these different branches were better linked, with an exchange of their results and theories. A growing amount of literature describes economics in humans and eco-ethology in birds making compromises between starvation, predation and reproduction. Numerous studies have been carried out on social cognition in primates but also birds and carnivores, and other publications describe market or reciprocal exchanges of commodities. We therefore hope that this paper will lead these different areas to a common decision science.
|
|
|
|
Poling, A., Temple, W., & Foster, T. M. (1996). The differential outcomes effect: A demonstration in domestic chickens responding under a titrating-delayed-matching-to-sample procedure. Behav. Process., 36(2), 109–115.
Abstract: The differential outcomes effect refers to the increase in speed of acquisition or terminal accuracy that occurs in discrimination training when each of two or more discriminative stimuli is correlated with a different outcome (e.g. type of reinforcer). The present study demonstrated this effect in domestic hens exposed to a titrating-delayed-matching-to-sample procedure, under which correct responses increased (and incorrect responses decreased) the delay between the offset of a sample stimulus and the onset of two comparison stimuli. Colors of key illumination (red, green) were used as sample and comparison stimuli and correct responses resulted in 1- or 4-s food deliveries. When 1-s food deliveries consistently followed correct responses to one key color and 4-s food deliveries followed correct responses to the other key color, the maximum delay reached by the hens and their overall accuracy was significantly higher than when 1- and 4-s food deliveries were randomly arranged following correct responses to both key colors. These data constitute the first demonstration of the differential outcomes effect in chickens, and in any species evaluated under a titrating-delayed-matching-to-sample procedure.
|
|
|
|
Snycerski, S., Laraway, S., & Poling, A. (2005). Response acquisition with immediate and delayed conditioned reinforcement. Behav. Process., 68(1), 1–11.
Abstract: Groups comprising eight rats initially were exposed to response-independent water deliveries, then to conditions under which a lever-press response raised an empty dipper immediately or after a resetting delay of 15, 30, or 45 s. When their performance was compared to that of control animals using a 90% confidence level, six rats in the immediate-reinforcement group met the primary criterion for response acquisition during a single 6-h session; 4, 4, and 3 did so in the 15, 30, and 45 s delay groups, respectively. Similar evidence of acquisition was obtained when a 95% confidence level was used. With a 99% confidence level, however, evidence of acquisition was not compelling. Although these data appear to provide the first demonstration of response acquisition in the absence of handshaping or autoshaping under conditions where the putative reinforcer is both conditioned and delayed, they also demonstrate that whether response acquisition occurs depends, in part, on how it is defined.
|
|
|
|
Zhang, T. - Y., Parent, C., Weaver, I., & Meaney, M. J. (2004). Maternal programming of individual differences in defensive responses in the rat. Ann N Y Acad Sci, 1032, 85–103.
Abstract: This paper describes the results of a series of studies showing that variations in mother-pup interactions program the development of individual differences in behavioral and endocrine stress responses in the rat. These effects are associated with altered expression of genes in brain regions, such as the amygdala, hippocampus, and hypothalamus, that regulate the expression of stress responses. Studies from evolutionary biology suggest that such “maternal effects” are common and often associated with variations in the quality of the maternal environment. Together these findings suggest an epigenetic process whereby the experience of the mother alters the nature of the parent-offspring interactions and thus the phenotype of the offspring.
|
|
