Quantity-based interference and symbolic representations in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes).

Boysen, Sarah T.; Berntson, Gary G.; Hannan, M. B.; Cacioppo, John T.

doi:10.1037/0097-7403.22.1.76

Cited by 206 publications

(260 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…For example, although chimpanzees readily learn an object match-to-sample task (given A as standard, choose alternative A rather than B), they have great difficulty learning a relational match-to-sample task (given AA as standard, choose alternative BB rather than CD) (Oden et al 2001;Premack 1983) -a task that human children can master before five years of age (Christie and Gentner 2007). Interestingly, these highly intelligent animals can learn and use numbers up to around 8 (Boysen et al 1996). For example, chimpanzees in Boysen's study could point to the correct Arabic numeral when given a set of items, and could point to a set of objects when given a numeric symbol.…”

Section: Relational Ability Across Speciesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mutual bootstrapping between language and analogical processing

Gentner¹,

Christie²

2010

Lang. cogn.

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Section: Relational Ability Across Speciesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mutual bootstrapping between language and analogical processing

Gentner¹,

Christie²

2010

Lang. cogn.

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“…In an often cited study by Boysen, Berntson, Hannan, and Cacioppo (1996) a chimpanzee was trained on a reverse contingency task. The chimpanzee was offered a choice between two plates, both of which had candy but one always had more pieces than the other.…”

Section: Primatesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The ephemeral reward task: Pigeons and rats fail to learn unless discouraged from impulsive choice.

Zentall¹,

Case²,

Berry³

et al. 2018

AB&C

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-The failure of certain species to learn a particular task while others learn it easily can help identify the learning mechanisms involved. In the ephemeral reward task, animals are given a choice between two distinctive stimuli, A and B, each containing an identical bit of food. If they choose A they get the food on A and the trial is over. If they choose B they get the food on B and they are allowed to get the food on A before the trial is over. Thus, it is optimal to choose B. Although cleaner fish (wrasse) and parrots acquire the optimal response easily, several primate species do not. Furthermore, pigeons and rats also appear to be unable learn to choose optimally. The failure of primates, pigeons, and rats to learn this task and the ease with which cleaner fish and parrots learn it raises important questions about the learning mechanisms involved in those differences. To account for these paradoxical findings, we proposed that certain species may have difficulty with this task because they tend to respond impulsively to the initial choice which has similar immediate outcomes and they do not associate the choice and reinforcement with the second reinforcement. To test this hypothesis, we temporally separated the initial choice from the first reinforcement by imposing a 20-s delay between the choice and its outcome. Under these conditions both pigeons and rats gradually acquired the optimal choice response. We suggest that impulsive choice may make it difficult to acquire certain tasks and imposing a delay between choice and outcome may decrease impulsivity and allow for closer to optimal task performance. Keywords -Ephemeral choice task, Suboptimal choice, Prior commitment, Delay of reinforcementWhen animals fail to acquire what appears to be a relatively simple task, it raises questions that can lead to a better understanding of principles of learning that may apply more generally to other tasks and to other species. Such a task is one we refer to as the ephemeral reward task.Psychologists have been studying the acquisition of relatively simple tasks by animals for over 100 years; from their escape from puzzle boxes (Thorndike, 1898) to simple conditioned reflexes (Pavlov, 1927). More recently the ability to show improvement with the learning in a serial reversal of a simple discrimination has been used as a proxy for the assessment of animal intelligence (Bitterman, 1965). In many cases intuition about animal intelligence has been confirmed with animals deemed to be more like humans doing better on these measures than those that are less like us. Thus, apes tend to show more improvement over reversals than monkeys, monkeys more improvement than rats, rats more improvement than pigeons and so on (Bitterman, 1965(Bitterman, , 1975. But as we will see, this is not always the case.

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“…Does the reverse reward task test for "self control"? Initially, studies on impulse control were mainly performed with humans (Mischel et al 1989;Russell et al 1991) and primates (Boysen and Berntson 1995;Boysen et al 1996;Silberberg and Fujita 1996;Kralik et al 2002;Genty et al 2004). Some authors have suggested that success in the reverse reward task may be interpreted as a form of "self control" thereby implying that in order to solve the task, some "awareness of self" needs to be involved (e.g.…”

Section: Methodological Considerationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In some species that failed to choose the non-preferred reward in order to obtain the preferred one, cues such as Arabic numerals for chimpanzees and colour cues for cottontop tamarins associated with the two quantities of food enabled the species to succeed (Boysen and Berntson 1995;Kralik et al 2002). DiVerences in performance when testing the subjects with food only or with Arabic numerals have been interpreted to result from a conXict between an associative disposition to select the smaller reward in order to obtain the large one and the intrinsic features of the food reward, which could be removed by using symbols (Boysen et al 1996;Boysen et al 1999). Also, in a diVerent procedure, the so called large-or-none contingency facilitated subsequent success in the reverse reward contingency.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Do cleaner fish learn to feed against their preference in a reverse reward contingency task?

2009

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The ability to control impulsive behaviour has been studied in animals with a standard test in which subjects need to choose the smaller of two food items in order to receive the larger one (reverse reward contingency). As a variety of mammals that have been tested so far (mostly primates) have great diYculties to solve the task, it has been proposed that it is generally cognitively demanding. However, according to an ecological approach to cognition, a species' ability to solve the task should not depend on its general cognitive abilities but on whether its ecology causes selective pressure on the ability to restrain foraging behaviour. We tested this hypothesis using the cleaner wrasse (Labroides dimidiatus), a Wsh species that feeds against its preference in nature when engaging in cleaning interactions with so called 'client Wsh'. None of the eight tested individuals learned to choose a non-preferred item after 200 trials. In a subsequent test, one subject learned to respond correctly in a large or none contingency task (only the choice of the small food was rewarded). After a short re-experience treatment, this individual learned to solve the reverse reward task after 30 trials. In conclusion, we did not Wnd support for the general idea that interactions with clients prepared cleaners to quickly solve a reverse reward test. However, the results suggest that the potential to solve a reverse reward contingency may not be restricted to mammals but could be present also in a Wsh species in which the problem of choosing a non-preferred food over a preferred one is an ever present challenge in nature.

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Quantity-based interference and symbolic representations in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes).

Cited by 206 publications

References 31 publications

Mutual bootstrapping between language and analogical processing

Mutual bootstrapping between language and analogical processing

The ephemeral reward task: Pigeons and rats fail to learn unless discouraged from impulsive choice.

Do cleaner fish learn to feed against their preference in a reverse reward contingency task?

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