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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons

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Comparative Psychology

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Lateralization

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Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Laterality Influences Cognitive Performance In Rainbowfish Melanotaenia Duboulayi, Anne-Laurence Bibost, Culum Brown Sep 2014

Laterality Influences Cognitive Performance In Rainbowfish Melanotaenia Duboulayi, Anne-Laurence Bibost, Culum Brown

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Cerebral lateralization has been suggested to convey a selective advantage to individuals by enhancing their cognitive abilities. Few, however, have explicitly compared the cognitive ability of animals with strongly contrasting laterality. Here, we examined the influence of laterality on learning performance in the crimson spotted rainbowfish, Melanotaenia duboulayi, using a classical conditioning paradigm. We also compared the learning ability of wild caught and captive-reared fish to examine the influence of rearing environment on cognitive performance. Laterality was established by observing which eye fish preferred to use while viewing their mirror image. Subjects were then conditioned to associate the appearance of …


Laterality Enhances Cognition In Australian Parrots, Maria Magat, Culum Brown Dec 2009

Laterality Enhances Cognition In Australian Parrots, Maria Magat, Culum Brown

Sentience Collection

Cerebral lateralization refers to the division of information processing in either hemisphere of the brain and is a ubiquitous trait among vertebrates and invertebrates. Given its widespread occurrence, it is likely that cerebral lateralization confers a fitness advantage. It has been hypothesized that this advantage takes the form of enhanced cognitive function, potentially via a dual processing mechanism whereby each hemisphere can be used to process specific types of information without contralateral interference. Here, we examined the influence of lateralization on problem solving by Australian parrots. The first task, a pebble-seed discrimination test, was designed for small parrot species that …