Lecture 8: Learning, Cognition & Culture Flashcards
What are the origins of behaviour?
- Innate (learned)
- Some learning (classical conditioning, operant conditioning)
- Cognitive (memory, problem solving).
Define ‘innate releaser (sign stimulus)’.
An effective cue in releasing a specific behavioural pattern.
Define ‘fixed action pattern’.
A sequence of innate behavioural acts that is essentially unchangeable and usually conducted to completion once started.
Define ‘supernormal stimulus’.
A stimulus that elicits a stronger response than the stimulus for which it is evolved.
Describe neural activity in terms of innate behaviour.
Neural circuits responsible for a behaviour may be fixed.
Describe neural activity in terms of learned behaviour.
Neural circuit responsible for a behaviour may be flexible (allowing modification according to past experience).
Give an example of an innate behaviour and the gene responsible.
Male drosophila courtship behaviour: chasing, licking, mounting, wing vibrations, abdomen curling… The Fru gene is responsible for learning more from experience i.e. to focus on females rather than males.
Define ‘learning’.
A relatively permanent change in behaviour as a result of experience.
Define ‘habituation’.
The continued presence of a stimulus causes the nervous system to down-regulate the response to the stimulus e.g. poking snails eye stalks.
Define ‘sensitisation’.
Continued exposure to the stimulus causes an increased response.
Define ‘associative learning’ and name the two kinds.
An external event becomes associated with an internal state or change in behaviour. Classical and operant conditioning.
Define ‘classical conditioning’.
A new stimulus is substituted for one that is already associated with the behaviour.
Define ‘operant conditioning’.
Animal associates its own behaviour with a reward or other consequence (trial and error learning).
Define ‘observational learning’.
The animal learns by watching and imitating others.
Define ‘local enhancement’.
The presence of another individual draws the observer’s attention to a (rewarding) location.
Define ‘cognition’.
The mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses
What limits an animals cognitive ability?
- Perception/memory
- Data manipulation
- Forming a representation on the environment.
Give examples of cognition.
- Numerical skills
- Spatial awareness (landmarks, memory)
- Tool use
- Individual recognition
- Self recognition.
Define ‘animal culture’.
The evolution of non-genetic behaviours within a group via vertical and horizontal transmission (with modification) of social information.
What are the common requirements of animal culture?
Social learning and tradition.
Define ‘arbitrary behaviour’.
The behaviour is unlikely to be connected with evolved traits.
Define the ‘ethnographic approach’.
Inter-population variation in behaviour that cannot be explained by environmental or genetic factors (i.e., adaptively and ecologically neutral/arbutrary).
