Involvement of the neural social behaviour network during social information acquisition in zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata)

Abstract

Female zebra finches Taeniopygia guttata will copy the novel foraging choice of males. The degree to which they do so, however, can vary considerably. Among-individual differences in social learning and their underlying neural pathways have received relatively little attention and remain poorly understood. Here, then, we allowed female zebra finches to observe livestreamed male demonstrators feeding from one of two novel-coloured feeders (social information acquisition phase). After this social information acquisition phase, we tested from which feeder the females preferred to feed to determine whether they copied the feeder choice of the male demonstrator (social learning test phase). We then examined the brains of these females for immediate early gene activity (c-fos) in the neural social behaviour network for the time during which they were observing the male feeding. Of the 12 regions and sub-regions in the brain examined we found only one weak correlation: greater copying was associated with lower activity in the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis, BSTmv. Future work should perhaps focus on neural activity that occurs during the stage in which there is evidence that animals have copied a demonstrator (i.e., social learning test phase in the current experiment) rather than during the period in which those animals observe that demonstrator (i.e., social information acquisition phase in the current experiment). What is clear is that the considerable emphasis on examining the behavioural component of social learning has not yet been accompanied by neural analyses. KeywordsBird • c-fos • Foraging • Immediate early gene • Social behaviour network • Social learning • Zebra finch Abbreviations AH anterior hypothalamus AMV* anterior ventral mesopallium BSTmd bed nucleus of the stria terminalis, dorsalmedial BSTmv bed nucleus of the stria terminalis, ventromedial BSTl bed nucleus of the stria terminalis, lateral dHP dorsal hippocampus LScv lateral septum, ventral caudal LScvl lateral septum, lateral ventral caudal LSr lateral septum, rostral mHP media hippocampus MS medial septum POM medial preoptic area VMH ventromedial hypothalamus * Lauren M. Guillette

What do zebra finches learn besides singing? Systematic mapping of the literature and presentation of an efficient associative learning test

“…Behaviours demonstrated by live or video-recorded birds include nest-building and foraging using specific coloured materials and lid removal. A computer-controlled feeding apparatus may also be used to assess the learning between partners through foraging scans Demonstration of foraging: (Benskin et al 2002 ; Camacho-Alpízar et al 2021 ; Guillette et al 2014 , 2022 ; Guillette and Healy 2014 , 2017 ; Katz and Lachlan 2003 ; Larose and Dubois 2011 ; Mora and Forstmeier 2014 ; Osbrink et al 2021 ; Riebel et al 2012 ; Templeton et al 2017 ; Van Leeuwen et al 2021 ); demonstration of nest-building: Breen et al 2019 ; Guillette et al 2016 ; Guillette and Healy 2019 ; Lid removal: Easter et al 2022 ; Farine et al 2015 ; foraging scan: Beauchamp and Kacelnik 1991 Spatial learning Spatial learning tests are used to assess a subject’s ability to recognise the location of the correct feeder based on environmental cues (e.g. surrounding and distant objects).…”