We recorded from neurons in the nidopallium caudolaterale, the avian equivalent of the mammalian prefrontal cortex, in four birds. The birds were required to peck a stimulus that indicated the amount of reward they would receive (small or large) after a certain delay (short or long). We found that the activity of neurons in the nidopallium caudolaterale was modulated by the value of the reward that would be received based on the reward amount and the delay to reward. We found that value coding was most prominent during the presentation of the sample period, and less so during the delay period and during the presentation of the reward itself. Our findings support the view that activity in nidopallium caudolaterale reflects the encoding of the value of reward based on a combination of reward amount and delay to a reward.

Whether animals can engage in prospective processing, looking ahead to what needs to be done, is an area of current interest in comparative cognition. We review some of the early behavioural and more recent neural evidence for prospective processing. Three classic behavioural studies, each adopting a different technique (confusion matrix design, samplecomparison mapping design, and modality-specific interference design), confirm that animals can engage in prospective processing. Mirroring these findings are more recent data that revealed neural evidence in favour of prospective processing. Overall, both behavioural and neural studies support the view that animals engage in prospective processing and plan for a future event. Key words：prospective processing, delayed matching-to-sample, delayed paired-associate task, planning for the future