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Full-Text Articles in Psychology
Stress Profile Influences Learning Approach In A Marine Fish, Vincent Raoult, Larissa Trompf, Jane E. Williamson, Culum Brown
Stress Profile Influences Learning Approach In A Marine Fish, Vincent Raoult, Larissa Trompf, Jane E. Williamson, Culum Brown
Personality Collection
The spatial learning skills of high and low stress juvenile mulloway (Argyrosomus japonicus) were tested in a dichotomous choice apparatus. Groups of fish were formed based on background blood cortisol levels and required to learn the location of a food reward hidden in one of two compartments. Low stress fish characterised by low background levels of the stress hormone cortisol had higher activity levels and entered both rewarded and unrewarded rooms frequently. Within the first week of exposure, however, their preference for the rewarded room increased, indicative of learning. Fish that had high background levels of cortisol, in …
Dominance And Leadership: Useful Concepts In Human-Horse Interactions?, Elke Hartmann, Janne W. Christensen, Paul Mcgreevy
Dominance And Leadership: Useful Concepts In Human-Horse Interactions?, Elke Hartmann, Janne W. Christensen, Paul Mcgreevy
Animal Training and Obedience Collection
Dominance hierarchies in horses primarily influence priority access to limited resources of any kind, resulting in predictable contest outcomes that potentially minimize aggressive encounters and associated risk of injury. Levels of aggression in group-kept horses under domestic conditions have been reported to be higher than in their feral counterparts but can often be attributed to suboptimal management. Horse owners often express concerns about the risk of injuries occurring in group-kept horses, but these concerns have not been substantiated by empirical investigations. What has not yet been sufficiently addressed are human safety aspects related to approaching and handling group-kept horses. Given …
Personality Affects Learning And Trade-Offs Between Private And Social Information In Guppies, Poecilia Reticulate, Larissa Trompf, Culum Brown
Personality Affects Learning And Trade-Offs Between Private And Social Information In Guppies, Poecilia Reticulate, Larissa Trompf, Culum Brown
Sentience Collection
The acquisition of information such as the location and quality of food, mates or shelter is a key survival requirement for animals. Individuals can acquire information through personal experience (private information) or through observing and interacting with others (social information). Environmental spatial and temporal heterogeneity can mean that sometimes social information conflicts with private knowledge. We tested how personality affected the importance placed on public versus private information in wild female guppies when these two information sources came into conflict. We found that boldness and sociality affected decisions to use conflicting social and private information. Bolder females used social information …
Evolutionary Responses To Invasion: Cane Toad Sympatric Fish Show Enhanced Avoidance Learning, Georgina Caller, Culum Brown
Evolutionary Responses To Invasion: Cane Toad Sympatric Fish Show Enhanced Avoidance Learning, Georgina Caller, Culum Brown
Aquaculture Collection
The introduced cane toad (Bufo marinus) poses a major threat to biodiversity due to its lifelong toxicity. Several terrestrial native Australian vertebrates are adapting to the cane toad’s presence and lab trials have demonstrated that repeated exposure to B. marinus can result in learnt avoidance behaviour. Here we investigated whether aversion learning is occurring in aquatic ecosystems by comparing cane toad naı¨ve and sympatric populations of crimson spotted rainbow fish (Melanotaenia duboulayi). The first experiment indicated that fish from the sympatric population had pre-existing aversion to attacking cane toad tadpoles but also showed reduced attacks on native tadpoles. The second …
Learned Recognition And Avoidance Of Invasive Mosquitofish By The Shrimp, Paratya Australiensis, Joshua D. Bool, Kristen Whitcomb, Erin Kydd, Culum Brown
Learned Recognition And Avoidance Of Invasive Mosquitofish By The Shrimp, Paratya Australiensis, Joshua D. Bool, Kristen Whitcomb, Erin Kydd, Culum Brown
Sentience Collection
Little is known about the learning ability of crustaceans, especially with respect to their anti-predator responses to invasive species. In many vertebrates, anti-predator behaviour is influenced by experience during ontogeny. Here, predator-naïve glass shrimp (Paratya australiensisis) were exposed to a predatory, invasive fish species, Gambusia holbrooki, to determine whether shrimp could learn to: (1) avoid the scent of Gambusia via classical conditioning; and (2) restrict their activity patterns to the night to reduce predatory encounters. Conditioned shrimp were placed in containers in aquaria containing Gambusia for 3 days during which time they could be harassed but not consumed by Gambusia. …
Environmental Enrichment And Prior Experience Of Live Prey Improve Foraging Behaviour In Hatchery-Reared Atlantic Salmon, C. Brown, T. Davidson, K. Laland
Environmental Enrichment And Prior Experience Of Live Prey Improve Foraging Behaviour In Hatchery-Reared Atlantic Salmon, C. Brown, T. Davidson, K. Laland
Aquaculture Collection
Atlantic salmon salmo salar L. parr were reared for 3 months under standard hatchery conditions or in a structurally enriched tank (containing plants, rocks and novel objects). Half of each of these fish had prior exposure to live prey in the form of live bloodworm while the other half were fed hatchery-pellets. After 12 days all fish were tested on a novel live prey item (brine shrimp). A significant interaction between the two factors (prior exposure to live prey and rearing condition) revealed that foraging performance was only enhanced in fish that had been reared in a complex environment and …
The Bold And The Shy: Individual Differences In Rainbow Trout, L. U. Sneddon
The Bold And The Shy: Individual Differences In Rainbow Trout, L. U. Sneddon
Aquaculture Collection
Boldness and shyness were investigated as ‘personality’ traits in hatchery-reared rainbow trout Oncorhynchus mykiss. Bold fish spent more time in an open area and were more active than shy fish and these behaviours could be used as indicators of boldness and shyness. These differences were related to learning ability in a simple conditioning task. Bold fish learned the task more quickly than shy fish.
Familiarity With The Test Environment Improves Escape Responses In The Crimson Spotted Rainbowfish, Melanotaenia Duboulayi, Culum Brown
Sentience Collection
Animals that are familiar with their environment have been reported to have greater survivorship for a number of reasons related to their knowledge of the terrain, which they recall from memory. In an initial experiment rainbowfish significantly improved their escape response towards a novel trawl apparatus over a sequence of five runs. Escape latencies were still low during a subsequent exposure 11 months after the initial exposure. While part of the improvement in escape success was certainly due to learning associated with the location of the escape route, it is likely that this was aided by habituation to the tank …