Heritability and the evolution of cognitive traits: Table 1

Croston, Rebecca; Branch, Carrie L.; Kozlovsky, Dovid Y.; Dukas, Reuven; Pravosudov, Vladimir V.

doi:10.1093/beheco/arv088

Cited by 114 publications

(102 citation statements)

References 161 publications

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“…Potentially, adults failed to modify their learned behavioural response to the familiar problem (opening the feeder) to fit the new situation (blocked or missing tread plate). This may suggest that juveniles are more flexible in their behaviour, which is also supported by their higher scores in exploratory diversity and consistent with research suggesting that behavioural plasticity decreases with age [53][54][55][56]. However, juveniles also had less reinforcement for the normally functioning feeders and hence less reinforcement history to overcome.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 80%

Can you teach an old parrot new tricks? Cognitive development in wild kaka ( Nestor meridionalis )

2016

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Despite recent efforts to characterize innovative individuals within a species, we still know very little about the ontogeny of innovation ability. A number of studies have found that innovation rates are correlated with personality traits, such as neophilia and exploration. Juvenile birds are frequently more neophilic and explorative, yet few studies have found evidence of age-related differences in innovative problem-solving success. Here, we show consistently higher innovation efficiency in juveniles of a wild, omnivorous parrot species across a variety of tasks and contexts. We tested 104 kaka (Nestor meridionalis), ranging in age from four months to 13 years. Twenty-four individuals participated in all three of our problem-solving tasks, two of which involved a familiar feeder and one an entirely novel apparatus. Juveniles were the most efficient problem-solvers in all three tasks. By contrast, the adults' success was context dependent and limited to the novel apparatus, which did not require modification of a pre-learned behavioural response. This suggests greater behavioural flexibility in the juvenile birds, who also showed higher persistence and exploratory diversity than adults. These traits may enable young kaka to discover efficient foraging techniques, which are then maintained throughout adulthood.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 80%

Can you teach an old parrot new tricks? Cognitive development in wild kaka ( Nestor meridionalis )

2016

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“…Another study of problem‐solving ability in great tits found that offspring survival was higher at nests that had at least one parent that could complete a problem‐solving task (Cauchard, Boogert, Lefebvre, Dubois, & Doligez, ). While it is still unclear whether innovativeness (or other aspects of cognitive ability) is a heritable trait in wild organisms (Croston, Branch, Kozlovsky, Dukas, & Pravosudov, ; Galsworthy et al., ; Plomin & Spinath, ; Quinn, Cole, Reed, & Morand‐Ferron, ), the differences in fitness detected in this and in previous studies could indicate there is an opportunity for selection to act on cognitive traits in the wild.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 72%

Problem‐solving skills are linked to parental care and offspring survival in wild house sparrows

Wetzel

2017

Ethology

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Individuals within a population often exhibit consistent differences in important behavioral traits such as parental care. One interesting, yet largely unexplored explanation for the existence of these consistent differences among parents is the idea that cognitive differences between individuals could lead to between‐individual variation in parenting behavior. I used a wild population of house sparrows (Passer domesticus) to test the nature of the relationship between aspects of cognitive ability (problem‐solving performance and learning) and parental care behavior, both measured in the wild. Furthermore, because parental care is tightly linked to fitness, I also investigated the relationship between problem‐solving performance and offspring survival. Parent sparrows were presented with a novel problem‐solving task that required them to remove an obstacle to obtain food. While there was no relationship between the ability to complete the task and measures of parental care (nestling provisioning rate or likelihood of provisioning with large food items), parents that solved the task quickly had higher provisioning rates than slow solvers. Additionally, the ability of fathers to complete the problem‐solving task was positively related to offspring survival. These results provide evidence that aspects of problem‐solving performance are positively correlated with parenting behavior and fitness in the wild.

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“…More importantly, any “psychophysical explanation” for the effect would not imply that the looming bias is not an evolutionary adaptation. Psychophysics does not preclude evolution and if there were a good psychophysical description of the effect, it is highly likely that the causal direction would go from the evolved adaptation to the psychophysical result (Cauchoix & Chaine, 2016; Croston, Branch, Kozlovsky, Dukas, & Pravosudov, 2015; Warren, 1981). …”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Looming sounds are perceived as faster than receding sounds

Neuhoff

2016

Cogn. Research

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Each year thousands of people are killed by looming motor vehicles. Throughout our evolutionary history looming objects have posed a threat to survival and perceptual systems have evolved unique solutions to confront these environmental challenges. Vision provides an accurate representation of time-to-contact with a looming object and usually allows us to interact successfully with the object if required. However, audition functions as a warning system and yields an anticipatory representation of arrival time, indicating that the object has arrived when it is still some distance away. The bias provides a temporal margin of safety that allows more time to initiate defensive actions. In two studies this bias was shown to influence the perception of the speed of looming and receding sound sources. Listeners heard looming and receding sound sources and judged how fast they were moving. Listeners perceived the speed of looming sounds as faster than that of equivalent receding sounds. Listeners also showed better discrimination of the speed of looming sounds than receding sounds. Finally, close sounds were perceived as faster than distant sounds. The results suggest a prioritization of the perception of the speed of looming and receding sounds that mirrors the level of threat posed by moving objects in the environment.

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Heritability and the evolution of cognitive traits: Table 1

Cited by 114 publications

References 161 publications

Can you teach an old parrot new tricks? Cognitive development in wild kaka ( Nestor meridionalis )

Can you teach an old parrot new tricks? Cognitive development in wild kaka ( Nestor meridionalis )

Problem‐solving skills are linked to parental care and offspring survival in wild house sparrows

Looming sounds are perceived as faster than receding sounds

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