The incentive value of a natural and cognitively demanding behaviour: food-caching jays as a model system

自然和认知要求行为的激励价值：以储存食物的松鸦作为模型系统

• 批准号: BB/I000690/1
• 负责人: Nicola Clayton
• 金额: $ 51.48万
• 依托单位: University of Cambridge
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2011
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2011 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=BB%2FI000690%2F1
• 关键词: incentive; value; natural; cognitively; demanding

The overall objective of this research is to study how inherently rewarding it is for an animal to perform a natural and cognitively demanding behaviour. The behavior that we will study is one that jays do for a living, namely hiding food for future consumption and relying on memory to find hidden stashes at a later date ('food-caching'). From a welfare perspective, there is increasing interest in using cognitive enrichment for captive animals (i.e. providing them with tasks that are mentally challenging), but there is a lack of scientific evidence as to whether and how cognitive activities are rewarding to animals per se. The proposed studies directly address this issue by investigating what aspects of caching behaviour the jays are most motivated to perform (i.e. the jays value the most), and how these decisions are influenced by the cognitive attributes of the behaviours, such as the jays' knowledge of the likelihood of successful recovery, and the bird's current or anticipated motivational state. To address these issues, we shall develop a decision paradigm for the jays in which the choice between two perches determines access to one of two cages. The jays will be given a choice between differing numbers of cache locations in these cages to find out whether their preference for the opportunity to cache is enhanced by how hungry they are, and whether the value they place on caching also depends on whether or not they have been prevented from caching either recently, or over longer time periods. We shall also investigate whether the birds' choices are also modulated by what happens when they come to recover their caches. This is important because in order for the recovery conditions to affect the jays' caching preferences, the birds must anticipate these conditions on the basis of their past experience of recovering their caches. To test this idea, we shall determine whether or not jays assign a higher value to caching in places from which they have the opportunity to recover and whether they assign a lower value to caching a type of food that has previously been stolen or has become spoiled. We shall also ask whether the opportunity to cache is affected by their feeding motivation at the time when they cache or when they come to recover the caches, and whether they value caching in private more than when others jays are present who could witness the caching event and therefore pose a threat to their caches. Taken together these experiments will provide important information about the caching decisions that jays make and the extent to which these decisions are influenced by cognitive and motivational factors. It will thus reveal how rewarding performance of this natural behavior is under different motivational and cognitive conditions that influence the outcome of caching behavior. By providing new information about the value of performing a cognitively demanding task, the project will allow us to investigate the rationale and potential for using 'cognitive enrichment' in welfare enhancement programmes.

这项研究的总体目标是研究动物执行自然且认知要求高的行为所带来的内在回报。我们将研究的行为是松鸦谋生的行为，即隐藏食物以供将来食用，并依靠记忆在以后找到隐藏的藏品（“食物缓存”）。从福利角度来看，人们越来越有兴趣对圈养动物使用认知强化（即为它们提供具有智力挑战性的任务），但缺乏关于认知活动是否以及如何对动物本身有益的科学证据。拟议的研究通过调查松鸦最有动力执行缓存行为的哪些方面（即松鸦最看重），以及这些决策如何受到行为的认知属性的影响，例如松鸦对成功恢复可能性的了解，以及鸟类当前或预期的动机状态，从而直接解决这个问题。为了解决这些问题，我们将为松鸦开发一种决策范式，其中两个栖息地之间的选择决定了对两个笼子之一的访问。松鸦将在这些笼子中不同数量的缓存位置之间进行选择，以了解它们对缓存机会的偏好是否会因它们的饥饿程度而增强，以及它们对缓存的重视程度是否还取决于它们是否在最近或较长时间内被阻止缓存。我们还将调查鸟类的选择是否也受到它们恢复缓存时发生的情况的影响。这很重要，因为为了使恢复条件影响松鸦的缓存偏好，鸟类必须根据过去恢复缓存的经验来预测这些条件。为了测试这个想法，我们将确定松鸦是否为它们有机会恢复的地方的缓存分配了较高的值，以及它们是否为缓存以前被盗或已变质的食物分配了较低的值。我们还将询问，缓存的机会是否受到它们在缓存时或恢复缓存时的进食动机的影响，以及它们是否比其他松鸦在场时更看重私下缓存，因为其他松鸦可以目睹缓存事件，从而对它们的缓存构成威胁。总的来说，这些实验将提供有关松鸦做出的缓存决策以及这些决策受认知和动机因素影响的程度的重要信息。因此，它将揭示在影响缓存行为结果的不同动机和认知条件下，这种自然行为的奖励表现如何。通过提供有关执行认知要求较高的任务的价值的新信息，该项目将使我们能够调查在福利增强计划中使用“认知丰富”的基本原理和潜力。

项目成果

Can male Eurasian jays disengage from their own current desire to feed the female what she wants?

雄性欧亚松鸦能否摆脱自己当前的欲望，给雌性喂食她想要的东西？

• DOI: 10.17863/cam.50017
• 发表时间: 2014
• 作者: Ostojic L

Experimenter expectancy bias does not explain Eurasian jays' (Garrulus glandarius) performance in a desire-state attribution task.

实验者的期望偏差并不能解释欧亚松鸦（Garrulus mudarius）在欲望状态归因任务中的表现。

• DOI: 10.1037/com0000043
• 发表时间: 2016
• 期刊: 1983)
• 作者: Ostojic L

Desire-state attribution: Benefits of a novel paradigm using the food-sharing behavior of Eurasian jays (Garrulus glandarius).

• DOI: 10.1080/19420889.2015.1134065
• 发表时间: 2016-03
• 期刊: Communicative & integrative biology
• 作者: Ostojić L;Cheke LG;Shaw RC;Legg EW;Clayton NS
• 通讯作者: Clayton NS

Eurasian jays (Garrulus glandarius) conceal caches from onlookers.

欧亚松鸦（Garrulus mudarius）向旁观者隐藏藏品。

• DOI: 10.17863/cam.50016
• 发表时间: 2014
• 作者: Legg E

Food sharing and social cognition.

食物分享和社会认知。

• DOI: 10.1002/wcs.1329
• 发表时间: 2015
• 期刊: Wiley interdisciplinary reviews. Cognitive science
• 作者: Legg EW