The concepts of 'sameness' and 'difference' in an insect
The concepts of 'sameness' and 'difference' in an insect
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DOI：
10.1038/35073582
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发表时间：
2001-04-19
期刊：
影响因子：
64.8
通讯作者：
Srinivasan, MV
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Giurfa, M;Zhang, SW;Srinivasan, MV
昆虫灵活地处理和学习信息以适应环境。蜜蜂Apis mellifera构成了在行为、细胞和分子水平上研究学习和记忆的传统模型（1）。早期的研究主要集中在初级联想和非联想形式的学习，这些学习由长鼻伸展反射的嗅觉条件反射（1）或操作性背景下的视觉刺激学习（2）决定。然而，研究表明，蜜蜂具有被认为只发生在某些脊椎动物物种中的认知能力。例如，蜜蜂可以插入视觉信息（3），展示联想回忆（4，5），分类视觉信息（6-8）和学习上下文信息（9）。在这里，我们表明，蜜蜂可以形成“相同”和“不同”的概念。他们学习解决“延迟匹配到样本”任务，其中他们需要对匹配的刺激做出反应，以及“延迟非匹配到样本”任务，其中他们需要对不同的刺激做出反应;他们还可以将学习到的规则转移到相同或不同感觉模态的新刺激。因此，蜜蜂不仅可以学习特定的物体及其物理参数，而且还可以掌握抽象的相互关系，例如相同和不同。
Insects process and learn information flexibly to adapt to their environment. The honeybee Apis mellifera constitutes a traditional model for studying learning and memory at behavioural, cellular and molecular levels(1). Earlier studies focused on elementary associative and non-associative forms of learning determined by either olfactory conditioning of the proboscis extension reflex(1) or the learning of visual stimuli(2) in an operant context. However, research has indicated that bees are capable of cognitive performances that were thought to occur only in some vertebrate species. For example, honeybees can interpolate visual information(3), exhibit associative recall(4,5), categorize visual information(6-8) and learn contextual information(9). Here we show that honeybees can form 'sameness' and 'difference' concepts. They learn to solve 'delayed matching-to-sample' tasks, in which they are required to respond to a matching stimulus, and 'delayed non-matching-to-sample' tasks, in which they are required to respond to a different stimulus; they can also transfer the learned rules to new stimuli of the same or a different sensory modality. Thus, not only can bees learn specific objects and their physical parameters, but they can also master abstract inter-relationships, such as sameness and difference.