Taking the operant paradigm into the field: associative learning in wild great tits

dc.contributor.authorMorand-Ferron, Julie
dc.contributor.authorHamblin, Steven
dc.contributor.authorCole, Ella F.
dc.contributor.authorAplin, Lucy M.
dc.contributor.authorQuinn, John L.
dc.contributor.funderLeverhulme Trust, United Kingdom
dc.contributor.funderNatural Environment Research Council, United Kingdom
dc.contributor.funderNatural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
dc.date.accessioned2016-02-17T10:07:56Z
dc.date.available2016-02-17T10:07:56Z
dc.date.issued2015
dc.description.abstractAssociative learning is essential for resource acquisition, predator avoidance and reproduction in a wide diversity of species, and is therefore a key target for evolutionary and comparative cognition research. Automated operant devices can greatly enhance the study of associative learning and yet their use has been mainly restricted to laboratory conditions. We developed a portable, weatherproof, battery-operated operant device and conducted the first fully automated colour-associative learning experiment using free-ranging individuals in the wild. We used the device to run a colour discrimination task in a monitored population of tits (Paridae). Over two winter months, 80 individuals from four species recorded a total of 5,128 trials. Great tits (Parus major) were more likely than other species to visit the devices and engage in trials, but there were no sex or personality biases in the sample of great tits landing at the devices and registering key pecks. Juveniles were more likely than adults to visit the devices and to register trials. Individuals that were successful at solving a novel technical problem in captivity (lever-pulling) learned faster than non-solvers when at the operant devices in the wild, suggesting cross-contextual consistency in learning performance in very different tasks. There was no significant effect of personality or sex on learning rate, but juveniles' choice accuracy tended to improve at a faster rate than adults. We discuss how customisable automated operant devices, such as the one described here, could prove to be a powerful tool in evolutionary ecology studies of cognitive traits, especially among inquisitive species such as great tits.en
dc.description.sponsorshipNatural Environment Research Council, United Kingdom (NE/I017208/1); Leverhulme Trust, United Kingdom (Grant RPG-265); Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (Discovery Grant 435596-2013)en
dc.description.statusPeer revieweden
dc.description.versionPublished Versionen
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdfen
dc.identifier.articleide0133821
dc.identifier.citationMorand-Ferron J, Hamblin S, Cole EF, Aplin LM, Quinn JL (2015) Taking the Operant Paradigm into the Field: Associative Learning in Wild Great Tits. PLoS ONE 10(8): e0133821. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0133821
dc.identifier.doi10.1371/journal.pone.0133821
dc.identifier.issn1932-6203
dc.identifier.issued8en
dc.identifier.journaltitlePLOS ONEen
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10468/2296
dc.identifier.volume10en
dc.language.isoenen
dc.publisherPublic Library of Scienceen
dc.rights© 2015 Morand-Ferron et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are crediteden
dc.rights.urihttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/en
dc.subjectProblem-solving performanceen
dc.subjectMixed-species flocksen
dc.subjectIndividual variationen
dc.subjectBehavioral flexibilityen
dc.subjectCognitive performanceen
dc.subjectSocial behavioren
dc.subjectMating successen
dc.subjectPersonalityen
dc.subjectEvolutionen
dc.subjectPopulationen
dc.titleTaking the operant paradigm into the field: associative learning in wild great titsen
dc.typeArticle (peer-reviewed)en
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Additional File 5: Free-ranging great tit registering two successful trials