Neophobia and innovation in critically endangered Bali myna, Leucopsar rothschildi
TL;DR: In this article, the authors found that Bali myna are repeatable in latency responses: 1) temporally in both experiments; 2) contextually in innovation experiment and between both experiments (and approach order), suggesting a stable behaviour trait.
Abstract: Cognition underlies animal behaviour, which is key to successful conservation strategies, yet largely under-utilised in conservation, though there are recent calls for closer integration. Conservation-relevant cognitive abilities can impact on adaptability and survival, such as neophobia, e.g., responses to novelty, and innovation e.g., problem-solving, particularly in today9s changing world. Bali myna are a critically endangered endemic species, which are a focus of active conservation efforts, including reintroductions. Therefore, gathering cognitive data can aid in improving and developing conservation strategies, like pre-release training and individual selection for release. In 22 captive Bali myna, we tested neophobia (novel object, novel food, control conditions), innovation (bark, cup, lid conditions) and individual repeatability. We found effects of condition and social environment, including longer latencies to touch familiar food in presence than absence of novel items, and between problem-solving tasks, as well as in the presence of conspecifics, compared with being alone, or with conspecifics and competing heterospecifics. Individuals were repeatable in latency responses: 1) temporally in both experiments; 2) contextually in innovation experiment and between both experiments (and approach order), suggesting a stable behaviour trait. These findings are an important starting point for improving conservation strategies in Bali myna and other similarly threatened species.
Citations
More filters
TL;DR: In this paper , the authors aim to increase the understanding and subsequent uptake of animal cognition research in zoos, by transparently outlining the main benefits and challenges associated with zoo-based cognitive research, which are animal-based and human-based.
Abstract: Animal cognition covers various mental processes including perception, learning, decision-making and memory, and animal behavior is often used as a proxy for measuring cognition. Animal cognition/behavior research has multiple benefits; it provides fundamental knowledge of animal biology and evolution but can also have applied conservation and welfare applications. Zoos provide an excellent yet relatively untapped resource for animal cognition research, because they house a wide variety of species-many of which are under threat-and allow close observation and relatively high experimental control compared to the wild. Multi-zoo collaboration leads to increased sample size and species representation, which in turn leads to more robust science. However, there are salient challenges associated with zoo-based cognitive research, which are animal-based (e.g., small sample sizes at single zoos, untrained/unhabituated subjects, side effects) and human-based (e.g., time restrictions, safety concerns, and perceptions of animals interacting with unnatural technology or apparatus). We aim to increase the understanding and subsequent uptake of animal cognition research in zoos, by transparently outlining the main benefits and challenges. Importantly, we use our own research (1) a study on novelty responses in hornbills, and (2) a multi-site collaboration called the "ManyBirds" Project to demonstrate how challenges may be overcome. These potential options include using "drop and go" apparatuses that require no training, close human contact or animal separation. This study is aimed at zoo animal care and research staff, as well as external researchers interested in zoo-based studies.
6 citations
References
More filters
Book•
01 Jan 1998
TL;DR: This chapter discusses Cognition, Evolution and the Study of Behavior, the Behavioral Ecology of Social Learning, and Cognitive Ethology and the Evolution of Mind, which aims to provide a framework for thinking about learning.
Abstract: Preface Acknowledgments Chapter 1. Cognition and the study of behavior 1.1 What is comparative cognition about? 1.2 Kinds of explanation for behavior 1.3 Approaches to comparative cognition 1.4 Summary Chapter 2. Evolution, behavior, and cognition: A primer 2.1 Testing adaptation 2.2 Mapping phylogeny 2.3 Evolution, cognition, and the structure of behavior 2.4 Evolution and the brain 2.5 What does all this have to do with comparative psychology? 2.6 Summarizing and looking ahead Part I. Fundamental Mechanisms Chapter 3. Perception and attention 3.1 Specialized sensory systems 3.2 How can we find out what animals perceive? 3.3 Some psychophysical principles 3.4 Signal detection theory 3.5 Perception and evolution: Sensory ecology 3.6 Search and attention 3.7 Attention and foraging: The behavioral ecology of attention 3.8 Summary Chapter 4. Learning: Introduction and Pavlovian conditioning 4.1 General processes and "constraints on learning" 4.2 A framework for thinking about learning 4.3 When and how will learning evolve? 4.4 Pavlovian conditioning: Conditions for learning 4.5 What is learned? 4.6 Conditional control of behavior: Occasion setting and modulation 4.7 Effects of learning on behavior 4.8 Concluding remarks Chapter 5. Recognition learning 5.1 Habituation 5.2 Perceptual learning 5.3 Imprinting 5.4 The behavioral ecology of social recognition: Recognizing kin 5.5. Forms of recognition learning compared Chapter 6. Discrimination, classification, and concepts 6.1 Three examples 6.2 Untrained responses to natural stimuli 6.3 Classifying complex natural stimuli 6.4 Discrimination learning 6.5 Category discrimination and concepts 6.6 Summary and conclusions Chapter 7. Memory 7.1 Functions and properties of memory 7.2 Methods for studying memory in animals 7.3 Conditions for memory 7.4 Species differences in memory? 7.5 Mechanisms: What is remembered and why is it forgotten? 7.6 Memory and consciousness 7.7 Summary and conclusions Part II. Physical Cognition Chapter 8. Getting around: Spatial cognition 8.1 Mechanisms for spatial orientation 8.2 Modularity and integration 8.3 Acquiring spatial knowledge: The conditions for learning 8.4 Do animals have cognitive maps? 8.5 Summary Chapter 9. Timing 9.1 Circadian rhythms 9.2 Interval timing: Data 9.3 Interval timing: Theories 9.4 Two timing systems? Chapter 10. Numerical competence 10.1 Numerosity discrimination and the analogue magnitude system 10.2 The object tracking system 10.3. Ordinal comparison: Numerosity, serial position, and transitive inference 10.4 Labels and language 10.5 Numerical cognition and comparative psychology Chapter 11. Cognition and the consequences of behavior: Foraging, planning, instrumental learning and using tools 11.1 Foraging 11.2 Long term or short term maximizing: Do animals plan ahead? 11.3 Causal learning and instrumental behavior 11.4 Using tools 11.5 On causal learning and killjoy explanations Part III. Social Cognition Chapter 12. Social intelligence 12.1 The social intelligence hypothesis 12.2 The nature of social knowledge 12.3 Intentionality and social understanding 12.4 Theory of mind 12.5 Cooperation 12.6 Summary Chapter 13. Social learning 13.1 Social learning in context 13.2 Mechanisms : Social learning without imitation 13.3 Mechanisms: Imitation 13.4 Do nonhuman animals teach? 13.5 Animal cultures? 13.6 Conclusions Chapter 14. Communication and language 14.1 Basic issues 14.2 Natural communication systems 14.3 Trying to teach human language to other species 14.4 Language evolution and animal communication: Current directions 14.5 Conclusions Chapter 15. Summing up and looking ahead 15.1 Modularity and the animal mind 15.2 Theory and method in comparative cognition 15.3 Humans vs. other species: Different in degree or kind? 15.4 The future: Tinbergen's four questions, and a fifth one References Index
1,775 citations
TL;DR: Here, it is outlined how central ideas in behavioural ecology and quantitative genetics can be combined within a single framework based on the concept of 'behavioural reaction norms', facilitating analysis of phenomena usually studied separately in terms of personality and plasticity, thereby enhancing understanding of their adaptive nature.
Abstract: Recent studies in the field of behavioural ecology have revealed intriguing variation in behaviour within single populations. Increasing evidence suggests that individual animals differ in their average level of behaviour displayed across a range of contexts (animal 'personality'), and in their responsiveness to environmental variation (plasticity), and that these phenomena can be considered complementary aspects of the individual phenotype. How should this complex variation be studied? Here, we outline how central ideas in behavioural ecology and quantitative genetics can be combined within a single framework based on the concept of 'behavioural reaction norms'. This integrative approach facilitates analysis of phenomena usually studied separately in terms of personality and plasticity, thereby enhancing understanding of their adaptive nature.
1,287 citations
TL;DR: It is concluded that pre-release training has the potential to enhance the expression of preexisting antipredator behavior, and potential training techniques involve classical conditioning procedures in which animals learn that model predators are predictors of aversive events.
Abstract: Animal reintroductions and translocations are potentially important interventions to save species from extinction, but most are unsuccessful. Mortality due to predation is a principal cause of failure. Animals that have been isolated from predators, either throughout their lifetime or over evolutionary time, may no longer express appropriate antipredator behavior. For this reason, conservation biologists are beginning to include antipredator training in pre-release preparation procedures. We describe the evolutionary and ontogenetic circumstances under which antipredator behavior may degenerate or be lost, and we use principles from learning theory to predict which elements can be enhanced or recovered by training. The empirical literature demonstrates that training can improve antipredator skills, but the effectiveness of such interventions is influenced by a number of constraints. We predict that it will be easier to teach animals to cope with predators if they have experienced ontogenetic isolation than if they have undergone evolutionary isolation. Similarly, animals should learn more easily if they have been evolutionarily isolated from some rather than all predators. Training to a novel predator may be more successful if a species has effective responses to similar predators. In contrast, it may be difficult to teach proper avoidance behavior, or to introduce specialized predator-specific responses, if appropriate motor patterns are not already present. We conclude that pre-release training has the potential to enhance the expression of preexisting antipredator behavior. Potential training techniques involve classical conditioning procedures in which animals learn that model predators are predictors of aversive events. However, wildlife managers should be aware that problems, such as the emergence of inappropriate responses, may arise during such training.
469 citations
01 Jan 2001
TL;DR: For instance, the authors pointed out that novelty and familiarity in features of the environment are important factors in the influence of stimuli that influence human behavior, and that novelty is correlated with familiarity.
Abstract: Nearly fifty years ago D. F. Berlyne (1950) wrote
Psychology has so far had surprisingly little to say about stimuli which influence behavior simply because they are new. Stimuli which owe their potency to the fact that they are not new ... have given rise to the vast corpus of observations and generalization that go to make up learning theory. But the everyday activity of both men and animals seem [sic] to attest to the importance of novelty as well as familiarity in features of the environment.
310 citations
TL;DR: Variation in boldness was assessed in captive‐bred swift fox (Vulpes velox) and tested for influence on survival after release and those judged previously as bold were less suited for release.
Abstract: Reintroduction of captive-bred animals is a key approach in conservation attempts for many endangered species, however, post-release survival is often low. Rearing conditions may be unlike those encountered upon release and the animals may not have had experiences necessary for survival in the wild. Animals may also habituate in captivity to stimuli that may pose a danger after release and/or there may be selection for behavioural traits, in particular reduced fearfulness, that may not be suited for the wild. Here, variation in boldness was assessed in captive-bred swift fox (Vulpes velox) and tested for influence on survival after release. Radio-tracked individuals that died in the 6 months following release were those judged previously as bold. In the presence of novel stimuli in captivity, they had left their dens more quickly, approached more closely to the stimuli and shown more activities indicating low fear than did those that survived. These individuals were less suited for release. Future selection of release-candidates on the basis of behavioural variation should enhance the success of reintroduction programmes.
254 citations