Individual Goffin´s cockatoos (Cacatua goffiniana) show flexible targeted helping in a tool transfer task

Abstract

Flexible targeted helping is considered an advanced form of prosocial behavior in hominoids, as it requires the actor to assess different situations that a conspecific may be in, and to subsequently flexibly satisfy different needs of that partner depending on the nature of those situations. So far, apart from humans such behaviour has only been experimentally shown in chimpanzees and in Eurasian jays. Recent studies highlight the prosocial tendencies of several bird species, yet flexible targeted helping remained untested, largely due to methodological issues as such tasks are generally designed around tool-use, and very few bird species are capable of tool-use. Here, we tested Goffin’s cockatoos, which proved to be skilled tool innovators in captivity, in a tool transfer task in which an actor had access to four different objects/tools and a partner to one of two different apparatuses that each required one of these tools to retrieve a reward. As expected from this species, we recorded playful object transfers across all conditions. Yet, importantly and similar to apes, three out of eight birds transferred the correct tool more often in the test condition than in a condition that also featured an apparatus but no partner. Furthermore, one of these birds transferred that correct tool first more often before transferring any other object in the test condition than in the no-partner condition, while the other two cockatoos were marginally non-significantly more likely to do so. Additionally, there was no difference in the likelihood of the correct tool being transferred first for either of the two apparatuses, suggesting that these birds flexibly adjusted what to transfer based on their partner´s need. Future studies should focus on explanations for the intra-specific variation of this behaviour, and should test other parrots and other large-brained birds to see how this can be generalized across the class and to investigate the evolutionary history of this trait.

Adult bonobos show no prosociality in both prosocial choice task and group service paradigm

“…To gain insight into the evolutionary basis of human prosociality, and to investigate to what extent animals show comparable levels of prosociality, an increasing number of studies has investigated prosociality in animals. Most experimental prosociality studies have focused on primates (reviewed in Marshall-Pescini et al, 2016 ), but more recent research has also demonstrated prosociality in other species, including rodents ( Hernandez-Lallement et al, 2015 ; Márquez et al, 2015 ; Schweinfurth & Taborsky, 2018 ; Lalot et al, 2021b ), canids ( Quervel-Chaumette et al, 2015 ; Dale et al, 2016 ; Dale et al, 2019a ; Dale et al, 2019b ), cetaceans ( Nakahara et al, 2017 ; Lalot et al, 2021a ), corvids ( Horn et al, 2016 , 2020 ; Massen, Haley & Bugnyar, 2020 ), parrots ( Krasheninnikova et al, 2019 ; Brucks & von Bayern, 2020 ; Laumer et al, 2021 ) and fish ( Satoh et al, 2021 ). However, other studies found no evidence for prosociality ( e.g .…”

Recent developments in parrot cognition: a quadrennial update

“…In prosocial choice tasks, African grey parrots (Krasheninnikova et al 2019b ) and kea (Heaney et al 2020 ) behaved prosocially, but did not seem to understand the corresponding contingencies. Moreover, African grey parrots helped conspecifics in a token exchange task whereas blue-throated macaws did not (Brucks and von Bayern 2020 ) and individual Goffin´s cockatoos provided tools for a partner to access a reward (Laumer et al 2021b ). We will first elaborate on the recent studies on instrumental helping before comparing finds of prosocial choice tasks to the early studies on African grey parrots (Péron et al 2013 , 2014 ).…”

“…A study on Goffin’s cockatoos also examined prosociality by exploiting their ability to use tools with different functions (Laumer et al 2021b ). Two birds were separated into different sections of a cage by a plexiglass wall with two windows.…”

“…One of the Goffin’s, mostly transferred the correct tool before any other tool in the test condition. The authors therefore concluded that instrumental helping was limited to individuals and discussed the results in light of the relationships within the dyads (Laumer et al 2021b ).…”

“…These studies have reported a tendency for different degrees of prosocial behavior in some, but not all, parrot species. Some parrots exerted effort to help conspecifics (Brucks and von Bayern 2020 ; Laumer et al 2021b ), whereas others provisioned partners at no cost to themselves (Krasheninnikova et al 2019b ; Heaney et al 2020 ). However, when no effort was necessary, birds also often chose to be prosocial in control conditions, in which the prosocial choice did not have any effect on the partner.…”