Kea (Nestor notabilis) show flexibility and individuality in within-session reversal learning tasks

Abstract

The midsession reversal paradigm confronts an animal with a two-choice discrimination task where the reward contingencies are reversed at the midpoint of the session. Species react to the reversal with either win-stay/lose-shift, using local information of reinforcement, or reversal estimation, using global information, e.g. time, to estimate the point of reversal. Besides pigeons, only mammalian species were tested in this paradigm so far and analyses were conducted on pooled data, not considering possible individually different responses. We tested twelve kea parrots with a 40-trial midsession reversal test and additional shifted reversal tests with a variable point of reversal. Birds were tested in two groups on a touchscreen, with the discrimination task having either only visual or additional spatial information. We used Generalized Linear Mixed Models to control for individual differences when analysing the data. Our results demonstrate that kea can use win-stay/lose-shift independently of local information. The predictors group, session, and trial number as well as their interactions had a significant influence on the response. Furthermore, we discovered notable individual differences not only between birds but also between sessions of individual birds, including the ability to quite accurately estimate the reversal position in alternation to win-stay/lose-shift. Our findings of the kea’s quick and flexible responses contribute to the knowledge of diversity in avian cognitive abilities and emphasize the need to consider individuality as well as the limitation of pooling the data when analysing midsession reversal data.

Well-developed spatial reversal learning abilities in harbor seals (Phoca vitulina)

“…The seal often performed without further errors after a single error at the beginning of a R, which suggests that it used the recent history of reinforcement to guide its behavior in line with conditional discrimination (Williams 1971) or the application of a strategy, as previously discussed. A comparable behavior was documented in macaques, rats, and kea, in contrast to pigeons, in so-called mid-session Rs, in which a R occurs in the middle of the session (Laschober et al 2021;Rayburn-Reeves et al 2017, 2013; whereas pigeons seem to use temporal cues to anticipate the point of R and thus started choosing the alternative stimulus before the actual onset of the R; macaques, rats, and keas respond with a change in response behavior only after having experienced the first error/negative feedback. In contrast to the mentioned mid-session R studies, the current experimental design of Rs starting at variable points in time within the session did not allow the seal to use their well-developed timing abilities (Heinrich et al 2016(Heinrich et al , 2020(Heinrich et al , 2021 to anticipate the point of R, but instead forced the seal to focus on the reinforcement history.…”

Recent developments in parrot cognition: a quadrennial update

“…Tightly connected to inhibitory control is the ability to quickly adjust one´s behavior in reaction to changing circumstances. In a recent reversal learning experiment, kea, who have previously waited up to 160 s to exchange a less desirable food reward for a preferred reward (Schwing et al 2017 ), showed highly flexible behavior (Laschober et al 2021 ). Test subjects had to discriminate between two images presented on a touchscreen.…”

Casting the Net Widely for Change in Animal Welfare: The Plight of Birds in Zoos, Ex Situ Conservation, and Conservation Fieldwork

“…The second is that individual birds even of the same species may react very differently to the world and will do so according to individual personality traits [ 81 , 82 ]. There is now plenty of evidence that personality or temperament has a good deal to do with a bird’s reproductive success and overall health [ 60 , 61 , 83 , 84 ]. They can suffer ‘mental’ health issues of varying degrees of severity—the worst of which, in cockatoos (family Cacatuidae), are stages of catatonic immobility and swaying while not attending to any external stimuli [ 27 ].…”