Introduction to animal cognition

Question 1

what is cognition?

Answer 1

It’s fundamental to psychology, defined as the study of the mind.

It provides an explanation for behaviour in terms of mechanisms, and these do not have to be neural (unless you’re a neuroscientist).

To use an analogy between us and a computer, we’re more interested in the software (mind) than the hardware (brain), though obviously there’s a synergy between the two.

Animal Cognition is the study of animal minds then

Question 2

why should we study animal cognition?

Answer 2

It’s interesting in its own right.

It provides valuable insights into human psychology. I’ll try and bring this out as I go through these lectures.

Many of our effective interventions (e.g. CBT) are, in part, based on work studying animal behaviour.

Much of what we know about the brain was initially based on work with animals (see Lee Hogarth’s lectures on neuroscience in the second half of this module).

Question 3

History I: Victorian biology

Answer 3

Romanes

Lloyd Morgan

Question 4

Romanes

Answer 4

Darwin’s nominated intellectual heir: advocated mental continuity

“Animal intelligence”: collection of anecdotes, interpreted mentalistically

Scala naturae of mental function – animals in order on scale of intelligence
- Not the full story

Question 5

Lloyd Morgan

Answer 5

Biologist

Sceptical of Romanes

Lloyd Morgan’s Canon: Invoke only those mental processes necessary to explain the observed behaviour – animals do something in experiment that we think we might do – not necessarily the case

E.g., enhancement vs. imitation.

Question 6

history II: The discovery of conditioning

Answer 6

Thorndike

Pavlov

Watson

Question 7

Thorndike

Answer 7

Experimental studies of instrumental learning

Claimed new complex behaviour arose through blind trial and error alone

Laws of Exercise (behaviour is strengthened by repetition) and Effect (behaviour is strengthened if “satisfying state of affairs” follows)

Coined term “reinforcement” - actions followed by consequences

Described behaviour in terms of Stimulus-Response bonds

Question 8

Pavlov

Answer 8

Observed “psychic secretions” of saliva in dogs

Devised theory of cortical excitation and inhibition to account for these conditional reflexes

Question 9

Watson

Answer 9

Reacting against introspectionist accounts of human mental life

Coined term “behavio[u]rism”

Assume animals are like simple machines until proved otherwise

Popularised Pavlovian “conditioning” as an explanation of all learning

“All psychology can be reduced to conditioning”

Question 10

Thorndike’s law of effect

Answer 10

responses followed/accompanied by satisfaction to animal, more firmly connected with the situation so when it recurs, they’re more likely to recur and vice versa - greater satisfaction = greater bond

Question 11

instrumental conditioning: the law of effect

Answer 11

The idea is that this is how habits form

Perception of the stimulus

Habits independent of consequences – set up by repeated pairing

stimulus –> response reinforcer

see notes

Question 12

Pavlov’s dogs

Answer 12

Tended to use a light rather than a bell

Difference between classical and instrumental conditioning = dog didn’t have to do anything

see notes

Question 13

history III: Methodological behaviourism (1920-1960)

Answer 13

Accepting the discipline of behaviourism: all research must focus on observable behaviour

But using behaviour to draw conclusions about underlying mental processes

Major figures: Hull and Tolman

Question 14

Clark Hull

Answer 14

Publications from ca. 1920 to ca. 1950

Wide range of topics

Interlocking theories of motivation and learning, through reinforcement

Best known experimental work on rats learning to run mazes and runways

In practice all learning explained by reinforcement of S-R bonds through reinforcement by drive reduction

Theories expressed in mathematical form, under the influence of falsificationist philosophy of science

Died 1951; theoretical tradition continued by Spence, Mowrer, Amsel, Capaldi.

Question 15

Edward Tolman

Answer 15

Experiments on rats

• in complex mazes or
• choosing between complex objectives

Introduced key cognitive concepts:

• Cognitive maps (his term)
• what we would now call Decision theory

Accounted for learning in terms of Stimulus-Stimulus associations – more explanatory power

Described thought as “internalised running backwards and forwards“

No well-known successors (though Lashley, Lawrence and others took forward some of his ideas), but known and respected by later animal cognition researchers, e.g. Tony Dickinson, Nick Mackintosh, John Pearce, Geoff Hall.

Question 16

history IV: The first cog alternative: Köhler and the Mentality of Apes

Answer 16

Gestalt psychologist studying problem solving in apes as an example of perceptual reorganization

Claimed to observe “insight”: changes in behaviour from trial to trial not explicable in terms of observable trial and error or reinforcement - sudden emergence of solution

Comparative studies (chickens, dogs, chimpanzees)

Status today? – can we actually see it in experiments?

Question 17

why methodological behaviourism failed

Answer 17

It didn’t - it just went out of fashion for a while…

Research was all based on rats when exciting new ideas about human cognition were becoming available via the computer analogy

But, in essence, it’s very much in the spirit of the psychological research that we do today.

Question 18

history V: Skinner and radical behaviourism

Answer 18

Not now influential

Taking behaviourism to extremes:

• Behaviour is all we can observe so psychology should simply be about behaviour.
• There is no “inside story” that is worth telling!

Early Skinner box studies with rats established

• key concepts of operant response and reinforcement
• key procedure of shaping

From the beginning, operant conditioning was applied (in the form of “behaviour modification”) to clinical, educational and other applied settings
- It was extremely influential for a time.

Question 19

why was radical behaviourism initially successful?

Answer 19

Skinner’s powerful polemic, e.g. “Are theories of learning necessary?“

Replacing apparently irresolvable theoretical arguments with directly observable “control over behaviour“

Huge range of powerful schedules meant any required behaviour could be produced on demand

Apparently “cognitive” effects could be synthesised using operant conditioning procedures

Radical behaviourism offered a simplifying and surprising philosophy

Question 20

why did radical behaviourism fail?

Answer 20

Denial of “inside story” simply incorrect.
- We all know there is something that goes on in the head

Skinner’s attempt to account for language mocked by Chomsky

Experiments on human operant conditioning showed marked differences from animal results

Question 21

origins of the new cognitive psychology

Answer 21

Revival of interest in Pavlovian conditioning produced a body of researchers with no debt to Skinnerian psychology

Dominance of cognitive approaches to psychology made a cognitive approach to comparative psychology logical

Question 22

recent work on Pavlovian conditioning

Answer 22

Started in late 1960s with Rescorla and Wagner in USA

Key experiments by Kamin, Holland and others

Theoretical and experimental advances by Mackintosh, Dickinson, Hall and Pearce in UK

Key theoretical concept became “representation” of stimulus and response events.
- Coding used in the head to connect one to another

Question 23

direct application of ideas from animal cognition to humans

Answer 23

Modern research on associative learning in humans takes ideas from animal learning and applies them to humans.

This has led to Dual Process Theory – whereby human mental life is understood in terms of a combination of associative and more cognitive (rule-based) processes.

An early example of this: McLaren, Green and Mackintosh (1994)

A more recent one in the same vein would be McLaren, I. P. L., Forrest, C.L., McLaren, R.P., Jones, F.W., Aitken, M.R.F. and Mackintosh, N.J. (2014).

Question 24

direct application if ideas from human cognition to animals

Answer 24

It cuts both ways!

Earliest example when ideas about attention obtained from studies with humans were used to explain discrimination learning (Sutherland & Mackintosh)

Demonstrations of powerful spatial learning (Olton) seemed to call for concepts of animal memory.

Complex discrimination learning experiments of Herrnstein and followers were reminiscent of concept formation (though this was too bold a claim).

As the next examples show, we should be wary of imputing our more cognitive abilities to other animals.

Always remember Lloyd Morgan’s Canon.

Question 25

social co-op learning in pigeons - or not

Answer 25

sender and receiver - see each other but not keys/lights

sender = lights

receiver = keys

reward if press right key with light

eventually can communicate and solve problem

Question 26

imitation in the rat - or not

Answer 26

watched demonstrator push a joystick either left or right

then when in same situation imitated the demonstrator

Question 27

self-awareness in the chimpanzee - or not

Answer 27

Gallup (1970) studied the reactions of chimpanzees and macaques to their mirror reflections (8 hours per day for 10-14 days)
Over time, chimpanzees showed an increase in the number of self-directed behaviours that relied on the use of the mirror
- Grooming parts of the body that would otherwise be visually inaccessible
- Picking bits of food from the teeth whilst looking in the mirror

The monkeys, however, reacted to the mirror socially, as if treating it as a conspecific* (as indeed had the chimpanzees during the first couple of days of exposure) - recent reports of monkeys eventually getting it.

Question 28

the Mark Test

Answer 28

After the exposure period, all subjects were anesthetised and bright red marks were placed on visually inaccessible locations on the body

• one eyebrow ridge
• the opposite ear

Upon re-exposure to the mirror, chimpanzees touched the mark more than other parts of their body

The monkeys did not touch the marks any more than any other part of the body

Question 29

self-awareness?

Answer 29

The mark test gives interesting results across different species, but is it truly an index of self-awareness? Or are some species just faster learners?

Learning to control ones actions on the basis of feedback in a mirror is undoubtedly a skill (e.g. shaving) but does it imply self-awareness?

Each time you shave do you think about it? Do you have to go through some process of recognising “that’s me” before you can begin?

And you know it’s you in a mirror, but does this help you learn mirror drawing?

I would argue that the evidence for self awareness here is weak.