Pigeons prefer to invest early for future reinforcers

Abstract

Five pigeons were trained in a series of conditions in which food was delivered after 25 responses, but only when a different (Investing) response had been made before the 25 responses had been completed. If an Investing response was not made, the 25 responses ended in blackout. In various conditions, effective Investing responses either had to be made before the first of the 25 responses, or anywhere within the 25 responses; and effective Investing responses either resulted in a stimulus change or did not. Pigeons Invested even when the consequences were temporally and spatially distant, but Investing was most likely when it produced an immediate stimulus change. When given the choice, pigeons preferred to make Investing responses at the beginning of a trial. These findings again demonstrate that behavior may be maintained by events that are separated in time and space from the present.

Extending a misallocation model to children’s choice behavior.

“…The ability to hold one’s own behavior in working memory—episodic-like memory (Zentall et al, 2001)—may thus be a fundamental determinant of control by reinforcers (see also Davison & Jenkins, 1985). Indeed, the ability to remember one’s own behavior has been demonstrated in nonhumans, ranging from cognitively “sophisticated” scrub jays (Raby et al, 2007) to “simpler” pigeons (e.g., Cowie & Davison, 2021; Killeen, 1978; Zentall et al, 2001) and cuttlefish (Jozet-Alves et al, 2013), suggesting it is a fundamental building block of learning rather than a species-specific ability. The constructive nature of episodic-like memory (Addis, 2018) might make perception of the response that produced the reinforcer particularly prone to detection error.…”