Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Commons™
Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 2 of 2
Full-Text Articles in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Geometric Rule Learning By Clark’S Nutcrackers (Nucifraga Columbiana), Alan Kamil, Juli E. Jones
Geometric Rule Learning By Clark’S Nutcrackers (Nucifraga Columbiana), Alan Kamil, Juli E. Jones
Papers in Behavior in Biological Sciences
Clark’s nutcrackers (Nucifraga columbiana) were trained to search in a location defined by its geometric relationship to 2 landmarks. Two groups were trained to search at different points along the line connecting the landmarks, and 2 groups were trained to find the 3rd point of a triangle, on the basis of either direction or distance from the landmarks. All groups learned and transferred to new interlandmark distances. However, the constant-distance group learned more slowly, searched less accurately, and showed less transfer than the other 3 groups. When tested with new orientations of the landmarks, the birds tended to …
The Cost Of Limited Attention In Blue Jays, Reuven Dukas, Alan Kamil
The Cost Of Limited Attention In Blue Jays, Reuven Dukas, Alan Kamil
Papers in Behavior in Biological Sciences
Experiments with fish and birds suggest that animals are unable to simultaneously allocate sufficient attention to tasks such as the detection of an approaching predator while searching for cryptic prey. We quantified the effects of limited attention on performance in controlled laboratory settings and report here the first direct evidence that attending to a difficult central task simulating foraging deters a bird’s ability to detect a peripheral target, which could be a predator. Our results fill a gap between ecological and neurobiological studies by illustrating that, although attention is an efficient filtering mechanism, limited attention may be a major cause …