A comparison of innovative problem-solving abilities between wild and captive spotted hyaenas, Crocuta crocuta

Benson‐Amram, Sarah; Weldele, Mary L.; Holekamp, Kay E.

doi:10.1016/j.anbehav.2012.11.003

Cited by 126 publications

(140 citation statements)

References 48 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

127

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Previous research comparing innovative problem solving between wild and captive spotted hyenas found that the captive animals greatly outperformed their wild counterparts [130]. We were able to rule out hypotheses suggesting that these differences result from excess energy or time available to captive animals.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 60%

Numerical assessment in the wild: insights from social carnivores

Benson‐Amram

Gilfillan

McComb

2018

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

SummaryPlayback experiments have proven to be a useful tool to investigate the extent to which wild animals understand numerical concepts and the factors that play into their decisions to respond to different numbers of vocalizing conspecifics. In particular, playback experiments have broadened our understanding of the cognitive abilities of historically understudied species that are challenging to test in the traditional laboratory, such as members of the Order Carnivora. Additionally, playback experiments allow us to assess the importance of numerical information versus other ecologically important variables when animals are making adaptive decisions in their natural habitats. Here, webegin by reviewing what we know about quantity discrimination in carnivores from studies conducted in captivity. We then review a series of playback experiments conducted with wild social carnivores, including African lions, spotted hyenas, and wolves, which demonstrate that these animals can assess the number of conspecifics calling and respond based on numerical advantage.We discuss how the wild studies compliment those conducted in captivity and allow us to gain insights into why wild animals may not always respond based solely on differences in quantity. We then consider the key role that individual discrimination and cross-modal recognition play in the 2 ability of animals to assess the number of conspecifics vocalizing nearby. Finally, we explore new directions for future research in this area, highlighting in particular the need for further work on the cognitive basis of numerical assessment skills and experimental paradigms that can be effective in both captive and wild settings.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 60%

Numerical assessment in the wild: insights from social carnivores

Benson‐Amram

Gilfillan

McComb

2018

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Many primate species can learn to use or even make tools in captivity when they would never do anything like it in the wild [64], and this effect may be found also in non-primate species [19,65]. Captive individuals are better problem-solvers in many species of mammals [58,66,67] and birds [65,68].…”

Section: Orangutans In Zoos and Rescue Centresmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Various explanations have been offered for the captivity effect [7,19,58,66]. One hypothesis emphasizes that humans may act as role models for the animals in captivity [22,52].…”

Section: (C) Captivity Effectmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

The reluctant innovator: orangutans and the phylogeny of creativity

Schaik¹,

Burkart²,

Damerius³

et al. 2016

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

One contribution of 15 to a theme issue 'Innovation in animals and humans: understanding the origins and development of novel and creative behaviour'. Young orangutans are highly neophobic, avoid independent exploration and show a preference for social learning. Accordingly, they acquire virtually all their learned skills through exploration that is socially induced. Adult exploration rates are also low. Comparisons strongly suggest that major innovations, i.e. behaviours that have originally been brought into the population through individual invention, are made where ecological opportunities to do so are propitious. Most populations nonetheless have large innovation repertoires, because innovations, once made, are retained well through social transmission. Wild orangutans are therefore not innovative. In striking contrast, zoo-living orangutans actively seek novelty and are highly exploratory and innovative, probably because of positive reinforcement, active encouragement by human role models, increased sociality and an expectation of safety. The explanation for this contrast most relevant to hominin evolution is that captive apes generally have a highly reduced cognitive load, in particular owing to the absence of predation risk, which strongly reduces the costs of exploration. If the orangutan results generalize to other great apes, this suggests that our ancestors could have become more curious once they had achieved near-immunity to predation on the eve of the explosive increase in creativity characterizing the Upper Palaeolithic Revolution.

show abstract

“…For example, birds in variable environments 41 and habitats were found to be less neophobic and have greater motor diversity and flexibility than 42 conspecifics in more stable environments (Mettke-Hofmann, Winkler & Leisler, 2002; Sol, Lefebvre 43 & Rodriguez-Teijeiro, 2005;Sol et al, 2011;Kozlovsky, Branch & Pravosudov, 2015). Persistence 44 was higher in social carnivores than in closely related non-social ones, as well as in captive hyenas 45 than in wild conspecifics (Benson-Amram, Weldele & Holekamp, 2013;Borrego & Gaines, 2016). 46…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Differences in persistence between dogs and wolves in an unsolvable task in the absence of humans

Rao

Bernasconi

Lazzaroni

et al. 2018

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

1 Despite being closely related, dogs consistently perform worse than wolves in independent problem-2 solving tasks. These differences in problem-solving performance have been attributed to dogs' 3 greater reliance on humans, who are usually present when problem-solving tasks are presented. 4However, more fundamental motivational factors or behavioural traits such as persistence, motor 5 diversity and neophobia may also be responsible for differences in task performance. Hence, to better 6 understand what drives dogs' and wolves' different problem-solving performance, it is essential to 7 test them in the absence of humans. Here, we tested equally raised and kept dogs and wolves with 8 two unsolvable tasks, a commonly used paradigm to study problem-solving behaviour in these 9 species. Differently from previous studies, we ensured no humans were present in the testing 10 situation. We also ensured that the task was unsolvable from the start, which eliminated the 11 possibility that specific manipulative behaviours were reinforced. This allowed us to measure both 12 persistence and motor diversity more accurately. In line with previous studies, we found wolves to be 13 more persistent than dogs. We also found motor diversity to be linked to persistence and persistence 14 to be linked to contact latency. Finally, subjects were consistent in their performance between the two 15 tasks. These results suggest that fundamental differences in motivation to interact with objects drive 16 the performance of wolves and dogs in problem solving tasks. Because correlates of problem-solving 17 success i.e. persistence, neophobia, and motor diversity are influenced by species' ecology, our 18 results support the social ecology hypothesis that postulates that the different ecological niches of the 19 two subspecies (dogs have evolved to primarily be scavengers and thrive on and around human 20 refuse, while wolves have evolved to primarily be group hunters and have a low hunting success rate) 21at least partly shaped their behaviours. 22 Introduction 23Animals need to solve various ecological and social problems to survive. Studies across taxa have 24 found problem-solving success to depend on several psychological propensities (also referred to as 25 the "correlates of problem-solving success"). These include neophobia (the fear of new situations or 26 objects), motor diversity and flexibility (the repertoire of problem-solving behaviours an animal 27 displays, and its ability to find novel solutions to already known problems, or use known solutions to 28 solve novel problems) and, most importantly, persistence (Lefebvre, Reader & Sol, 2004; Biondi, Bó 29 & Vassallo, 2010;Hiestand, 2011;Cole, Cram & Quinn, 2011;Morand-Ferron et al., 2011; Thornton 30 & Samson, 2012;Benson-Amram & Holekamp, 2012;Griffin & Guez, 2014;Moretti et al., 2015; 31 Griffin & Diquelou, 2015;Huebner & Fichtel, 2015;Udell, 2015;Borrego & Gaines, 2016) (defined 32 as task directed motivation and quantified as the amount of time an animal sp...

show abstract

A comparison of innovative problem-solving abilities between wild and captive spotted hyaenas, Crocuta crocuta

Cited by 126 publications

References 48 publications

Numerical assessment in the wild: insights from social carnivores

Numerical assessment in the wild: insights from social carnivores

The reluctant innovator: orangutans and the phylogeny of creativity

Differences in persistence between dogs and wolves in an unsolvable task in the absence of humans

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About