Chimpanzees' use of conspecific cues in matching-to-sample tasks: public information use in a fully automated testing environment (original) (raw)

2011, Animal cognition

Social animals have much to gain from observing and responding appropriately to the actions of their conspecific group members. This can in turn lead to the learning of novel behavior patterns (social learning) or to foraging, ranging, or social behavioral choices copied from fellow group members, which do not necessarily result in long-term learning, but at the time represent adaptive responses to environmental cues (public information use). In the current study, we developed a novel system for the study of public information use under fully automated conditions. We modified a classic single-subject laboratory paradigm—matching-to-sample (MTS)—and examined chimpanzees’ ability to interpret and utilize cues provided by the behavior of a conspecific to solve the task. In Experiment 1, two subjects took turns on an identity MTS task, with one subject (the model) performing the first half of the trial and the other subject (the observer) completing the trial using the model’s actions as discriminative cues. Both subjects performed above chance from the first session onwards. In Experiment 2, the subjects were tested on a symbolic version of the same MTS task, with one subject showing spontaneous transfer. Our study establishes a novel method for examining public information use within a highly controlled and automated setting.

Chimpanzees demonstrate individual differences in social information use

Animal cognition, 2018

Studies of transmission biases in social learning have greatly informed our understanding of how behaviour patterns may diffuse through animal populations, yet within-species inter-individual variation in social information use has received little attention and remains poorly understood. We have addressed this question by examining individual performances across multiple experiments with the same population of primates. We compiled a dataset spanning 16 social learning studies (26 experimental conditions) carried out at the same study site over a 12-year period, incorporating a total of 167 chimpanzees. We applied a binary scoring system to code each participant's performance in each study according to whether they demonstrated evidence of using social information from conspecifics to solve the experimental task or not (Social Information Score-'SIS'). Bayesian binomial mixed effects models were then used to estimate the extent to which individual differences influenced ...

Evidence of model based transmission bias in captive chimpanzees: initial tool choice matches proficient groupmate

2016

Social learning theories predict biased transmission dictating what and whom is copied. We presented a novel tool-use task to six groups of captive chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) to investigate a model proficiency bias. The study included six groups totalling 54 chimpanzees (24 males) housed in six social groups at the KCCMR, University of Texas, U.S.A. Subjects were aged 12- to 43-years-old (M = 24.5 years, SD = 7). In each of four groups (N = 33, Males = 18), two models were trained to use one of two visually and functionally different ‘hook’ and ‘spoon’ tools to obtain baskets containing food that were otherwise out-of-reach. Once trained, the models demonstrated their tool-use in the presence of the group. The two models differed in their novel-task-solving proficiency as ascertained by prior interactions with novel tasks (also observed by group members) and caregiver ratings of each chimpanzee’s general proficiency. Two groups of ‘control’ chimpanzees (N = 21) had no prior infor...

Chimpanzees show some evidence of selectively acquiring information by using tools, making inferences, and evaluating possible outcomes

PloS one, 2018

Metacognition refers to thinking about one's thinking or knowing what one knows. Research suggests that this ability is not unique to humans and may be shared with nonhuman animals. In particular, great apes have shown behaviors on a variety of tasks that are suggestive of metacognitive ability. Here we combine a metacognitive task, the information-seeking task, with tool use and variable forms of initial information provided to chimpanzees to explore how informational states impact behavioral responses in these apes. Three chimpanzees were presented with an apparatus that contained five locations where food could be hidden. If they pointed to the correct location, they received the reward, but otherwise they did not. We first replicated several existing findings using this method, and then tested novel hypotheses. The chimpanzees were given different types of information across the experiments. Sometimes, they were shown the location of the food reward. Other times, they were s...

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