The cognitive ecology of animal construction behaviour: Individual differences in asocial and social learning

从观察他人中学习的能力被称为社交学习，这使得动物(包括人类)能够学习如何解决问题，而不需要进行耗时的反复学习。社会学习被认为是形成和保持文化传统的基石。虽然已经很好地研究了吃什么食物、和谁交配、唱什么歌以及从别人那里避开谁，但我们对动物与其环境的物理特征(物理认知)进行互动和操纵时，社会学习所起的作用知之甚少。一个受到广泛关注的动物身体认知的例子是工具的使用，尽管很少有动物从事这一行为，更少的动物似乎是通过观察他人来学习工具的。在这里，我提出了一个新的系统来研究有关身体问题的信息是如何从社会上获得的：在鸟身上筑巢。长期以来，我们一直被鸟类筑巢的美丽和多样性所吸引。对于鸟类本身来说，建造正确的巢是它们繁殖成功的关键：如果它们的巢建对了，它们就有机会产下幼鸟，如果它们的巢建错了，它们肯定会失败。尽管鸟巢很重要，但我们仍然不知道一只鸟是如何知道要建什么巢的。几乎每只鸟都会建造某种类型的巢来下蛋和哺育幼鸟。由于这将鸟类与环境紧密地联系在一起，建筑商将从观察其他人的成功和失败中学到很多东西。鉴于气候变化，建造合适的鸟巢是一项特别重要的成就。我建议测试鸟类如何使用其他人提供的信息来学习如何筑巢。我会通过试验性地操纵在受控实验室和室外鸟舍环境中提供给斑马雀的社会信息来做到这一点。然后，我将衡量这些鸟在做出自己筑巢决定时使用社会信息的程度。斑马雀在研究社会学习在筑巢中的作用方面很有用，因为它们全年都在筑巢，材料多样，在筑巢时允许其他鸟儿靠近，幼鸟在90天大的时候达到性成熟并建立第一个巢。我要问的四个具体问题是：(1)鸟类什么时候学习；(2)它们学习什么；(3)社会学习的重要性是什么；(4)大脑的哪个部分在社会学习中是重要的？我为回答这些问题而进行的实验将开始探讨社交学习在多大程度上支撑着这种鲜为人知但基本的鸟类行为。由于筑巢和更普遍的筑巢行为在动物中很常见，这个项目为旨在理解社会学习进化的更大规模的比较分析奠定了基础。

The ability to learn from watching others, called social learning, allows animals (including humans) to learn how to solve problems without engaging in time-consuming trial-and-error learning. Social learning is thought to be a cornerstone to forming and maintaining cultural traditions. While learning what food to eat, who to mate with, what song to sing and who to avoid from others has been well studied we know much less about the role social learning plays when animals are interacting with and manipulating physical features of their environment (physical cognition). One example of physical cognition in animals that has received lots of attention is tool use, although very few animals engage in this behaviour and even fewer appear to learn about tools from watching others. Here I propose a new system to study how information about physical problems may be learned socially: nest building in birds. We have long been fascinated by the beauty and diversity of nests that are built by birds. For the birds themselves, building the correct nest is key to their reproductive success: if they get the nest right they have a chance to fledge young, if they get the nest wrong, they will surely fail. Despite the importance of nests we still do not know how a bird knows what nest to build. Almost every bird builds some type of nest in which to lay eggs and rear young. As this intimately links a bird to the environment a builder stands to learn a lot from observing both the success and failure of others. In the light of climate change building the right nest is an especially important accomplishment. I propose to test how birds use information provided by other individuals to learn how to build a nest. I would do this by experimentally manipulating the social information that is provided to zebra finches in both a controlled laboratory and an outdoor aviary environment. Then I will measure the extent that these birds use social information when they make their own nest-building decisions. Zebra finches are useful for studying the role of social learning in nest building because they build year-round, with a diversity of material, allow others near when they are building, and the young reach sexual maturity and build their first nest when they are 90 days old. The four specific questions I would ask are: (1) when do birds learn; (2) what are they learning; (3) what is the importance of social learning, and (4) what part of the brain is important in social learning? The experiments I would conduct to answer these questions will begin to address the extent to which social learning underpins this little-known but fundamental avian behaviour. Because nest building specifically, and construction behaviour more generally, is common among animals, this projects lays the ground work for a larger comparative analysis aimed at understanding the evolution of social learning.