We know that humans can learn

We know that humans can learn

Learning in Animals Which animals are able to learn? (Hint: all animals have nervous systems) Reasonable guess: All animals can learn!! (Def.) Learning is a relatively long-lasting modification of behavior due to experience or practice.

Psychology has focused on 2 types of learning: * classical conditioning * operant conditioning Biologist View of Psychology: 1) Too much focus on rats & mice (what about insects fish reptiles??) 2) Too little focus on other types of learning

We ll consider the following types of learning: - habituation - classical conditioning associative learning - operant conditioning - avoidance learning - imprinting - spatial learning - cultural = observational learning

MEMORY Is learning possible without memory?? (review learning def.) Some animals: short term short-term and long-term memory Events stored in long-term memory have to 1st pass through short-term. Examples of animal long-term memory?? Migrating Pacific salmon

Salmon life cycle END BEGIN Out Migration Upriver Migration Ocean Phase

Animals have behavioral repertoires Source of repertoires?? Behaviors are 1) Learned or 2) Innate = instinctual (= genetically endowed) or 3) Some combination of genes & learning i.e., the old NATURE vs NURTURE argument

Can We Generalize?? What types of animals rely mostly on instinct? lower animals: invertebrates lower vertebrates What types benefit from their ability to learn? higher vertebrates

An Instinctual Animal the Organ Pipe Mud Dauber ADULT

The newly-emerged adult wasp.. Automatically begins building a new mud nest

Automatically begins hunting spiders 1 Egg per cell (paralyzed)

Are mud daubers robots?? No need or capacity to learn?? All behaviors hard-wired?? They probably learn, through experience, to: -build nests more efficiently - find prey faster - navigate their surroundings better. - avoid predators

Instinctual Behavior

Learning Type 1: Habituation Gradual disappearance of a response to a novel stimulus that proves to be non-threatening. EXAMPLE: Peckham & Peckham (1894) struck a tuning fork in front of an orb-weaving spider. Spider dropped shorter & shorter distances with each successive sound.

Crayfish escape reaction Tail-flip reflex diminishes with repeated touches

Nereis a marine worm living in sediments Response to Threatening Stimuli SHADOW

Habituation of Nereis (marine worm) to 2 stimuli Stimulus-specificity Time-sensitivity

EXAMPLE: YCP Senior Thesis by Becky Brown Looked at fright reactions in Tyler Run minnows. Her interest: Were minnows at the campus road crossing habituated to car spray? Compared crossing and downstream minnows for reactions to spray.

car crossing car spray zone TYLER RUN pool HUMANITIES YCP Blacknose Dace

Becky with Supersoaker Record Swimming Activity - before spray - after spray

BECKY S DATA Swimming Activity Reaction of YCP Tyler Run Minnows to a water spray disturbance 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0 Road-crossing Minnows Downstream Minnows 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 Minutes Minutes Recovery No Recovery Water Spray

Learning Type 2: Classical Conditioning Russian Ivan Pavlov discovered CC what was his animal model?

CLASSICAL CONDITIONING Vocab Stimulus Response (= Unconditioned Stimulus) (= Unconditioned Response) Neutral Stimulus + US UR training Neutral Stimulus UR (= conditioned stimulus) (= conditioned response) CS CR

Applying the vocabulary Becomes CS US =? UR =? meat powder salivation

Learning Type 3: Operant Conditioning (also called trial & error learning) Animal comes to associate its behavior with the consequences of the behavior. Consequences are either 1) Obtaining something good (e.g., food) 2) Avoiding something bad (e.g., electric shock)

BAR that may deliver food pellets (+) FLOOR may deliver electric current (-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqtdtddr8vs

Behavior can be shaped by reinforcing successive approximations +

Learning Type 4: Avoidance Learning Recognizing, from experience, a dangerous or unpleasant situation and avoiding it. Most-studied: Conditioned Taste Aversion Animal associates discomfort or illness with food/drink Result: future encounters with that food will be avoided. Efficiency?? Usually one-trial learning!! NOT JUST BAD TASTE!

Examples?? Rats avoiding poison Predators avoiding monarch butterflies some toads gila monster lizards Rehnberg & Cassolet Rehnberg & Sherry Your own experience?

Learning Type 5: Imprinting A rapid and irreversible attraction or affiliation to an organism(s) or place that happens early in life. Example 1: Konrad Lorenz and water fowl Example 2: Homing of Pacific salmon

Imprinting to odors of natal stream Critical Period?? SMOLT STAGE Pacific Ocean (Reproductive Migration of Pacific Salmon)

HOME IMPRINTED MIGRANTS

Learning Type 6: Spatial Learning Recognizing and remembering features of home area or territory to allow accurate movements. Probably widespread... * Any animal that leaves nest to find food or mates and then returns is guided by spatial learning. * Any animal that stores food must find it later guided by spatial learning.

Example of Spatial Learning: Nest Location

?

Useful Spatial Learning: Finding stored food Family Corvidae (crows & jays) are powerful spatial learners Example: Clark s Nutcracker High mountain habitat: Must find stored seeds in winter

Find food Cache (hide) it. Find Clark s Nutcracker Finding it later requires memory of location which resulted from spatial learning.

MEMORY DEMONSTRATION EXPERIMENT Large room 330 holes in floor central feeder rocks, logs, etc. on floor Bird allowed to cache seeds in holes on Day 0 9.5 months!! On Days 11, 82, 183, & 285 birds did better than random!!.. F

Seed Caching in 3 Species of Western Corvids (crows) Winter Cached Species Elevation diet seeds/yr Clark s nutcracker highest 100% cached 33,000 Pinyon jay middle 70-90 20,000 Scrub jay lowest?? 6,000

(remembering locations on a computer monitor) Clark s

(remembering colors on a computer monitor) Clark s

Learning Type 6: Cultural Learning (= observational learning) An animal may learn a behavior by watching or otherwise sensing what another animal is doing. Learning by "copying". BUT it s more than momentary imitation. The learned behavior may appear some time after the original observation(s).

EXAMPLE: Imo was a female Japanese macaque that was the source of new food-cleaning techniques. Imo introduced washing sweet potatoes to remove grit. She also introduced the washing of wheat grains: float them and the grit sinks. These behaviors spread slowly through the group. passage from Drickamer, p. 177

Learning Type 4: Insight Learning Aha!

Insight Learning Formulating new behaviors or solutions to problems by thinking about them. May require making mental models or simulations to discover hypothetical outcomes - Most advanced? - Consciousness? - Taxonomically limited - Animal evidence limited & controversial

Insight Learning Kohler s chimps

New Caledonian Crow

Insight Learning? Operant Conditioning? Mere Instinct?