Innovative foraging behaviour in birds: What characterizes an innovator?

Overington, Sarah E.; Cauchard, Laure; Côté, Kimberly-Ann; Lefebvre, Louis

doi:10.1016/j.beproc.2011.06.002

Cited by 140 publications

(126 citation statements)

References 58 publications

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“…It is unlikely that neophobia greatly inhibited the adult's problem-solving success [13,15]. Although it is conceivable that neophobia caused the adults to avoid touching or moving the novel block in experiment 1, adults also failed the lid-opening task where no novel object was present.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…Studies looking at within-species variation in the tendency to innovate frequently reveal correlations with personality traits, such as high exploration rates and low levels of neophobia [13][14][15]. Social factors, such as larger group size [16,17], rapid social learning [18,19], or lower competitive ability [20,21], may also increase innovativeness.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Can you teach an old parrot new tricks? Cognitive development in wild kaka ( Nestor meridionalis )

2016

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Despite recent efforts to characterize innovative individuals within a species, we still know very little about the ontogeny of innovation ability. A number of studies have found that innovation rates are correlated with personality traits, such as neophilia and exploration. Juvenile birds are frequently more neophilic and explorative, yet few studies have found evidence of age-related differences in innovative problem-solving success. Here, we show consistently higher innovation efficiency in juveniles of a wild, omnivorous parrot species across a variety of tasks and contexts. We tested 104 kaka (Nestor meridionalis), ranging in age from four months to 13 years. Twenty-four individuals participated in all three of our problem-solving tasks, two of which involved a familiar feeder and one an entirely novel apparatus. Juveniles were the most efficient problem-solvers in all three tasks. By contrast, the adults' success was context dependent and limited to the novel apparatus, which did not require modification of a pre-learned behavioural response. This suggests greater behavioural flexibility in the juvenile birds, who also showed higher persistence and exploratory diversity than adults. These traits may enable young kaka to discover efficient foraging techniques, which are then maintained throughout adulthood.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Can you teach an old parrot new tricks? Cognitive development in wild kaka ( Nestor meridionalis )

2016

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“…Innovations are rarely observed in the field both because of their rare and unpredictable nature, and also because recognizing an act as an innovation requires a comprehensive knowledge of the behaviour of the study species, which may require thousands of hours of behavioural observations [7]. In order to better understand the behavioural and cognitive processes underlying innovation among captive animals, researchers have adopted the strategy of inducing innovation by presenting individuals with a novel problem-solving task [3,[8][9][10][11][12][13]. Although a few studies have now demonstrated individual variation in problem-solving abilities [3,6,11,14,15], we still know very little about the characteristics that vary among individual conspecifics to make them more or less innovative [13].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Exploration is typically quantified by examining the extent to which an individual investigates a novel area or object, including measures such as the time spent in the novel area, the amount of space the individual covers, the amount of time spent near the novel object, the number of sides or parts of the object contacted, or the latency to approach novel objects in their environment [8,13,14,[28][29][30][31][32]. In this study, we focused on the variety of behaviours that hyenas exhibited when interacting for the first time with a novel problem-solving apparatus, and thus we did not rely exclusively on these traditional temporal or spatial measures.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Innovative problem solving by wild spotted hyenas

2012

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Innovative animals are those able to solve novel problems or invent novel solutions to existing problems. Despite the important ecological and evolutionary consequences of innovation, we still know very little about the traits that vary among individuals within a species to make them more or less innovative. Here we examine innovative problem solving by spotted hyenas (Crocuta crocuta) in their natural habitat, and demonstrate for the first time in a non-human animal that those individuals exhibiting a greater diversity of initial exploratory behaviours are more successful problem solvers. Additionally, as in earlier work, we found that neophobia was a critical inhibitor of problem-solving success. Interestingly, although juveniles and adults were equally successful in solving the problem, juveniles were significantly more diverse in their initial exploratory behaviours, more persistent and less neophobic than were adults. We found no significant effects of social rank or sex on success, the diversity of initial exploratory behaviours, behavioural persistence or neophobia. Our results suggest that the diversity of initial exploratory behaviours, akin to some measures of human creativity, is an important, but largely overlooked, determinant of problem-solving success in non-human animals.

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“…Yet, it seems unlikely that Mallards would have much success at capturing birds outside of the bird breeding season when fledglings are abundant, both on land and at the water's edge. Innovation during foraging can result in the development of new behaviors or the modification of existing ones to take advantage of new opportunities in the environment, such as the exploitation of new food sources (Overington et al 2011). If Mallards were limited by the lack of animal protein, for instance due to intense competition for insect larvae by fish introduced for angling (Hill et al 1987), it is possible that the inclusion of a new, energy-rich food source would offer a significant advantage at a critical time of the year.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%