Comparative Cognition Notes

Comparative cognition is the study of information processing across species.
Focuses on memory, categorization, decision making, problem-solving, language use, and deception.
Compares abilities across species.
Researchers avoid anthropomorphism by operationalizing variables and defining behavior precisely.
Comparative designs, correlational studies, observational studies, case studies, and experimental research are used.

Used to categorize research findings in comparative psychology.
Ultimate Cause:
- Purpose for survival or reproduction. Example: Taste aversion learning to avoid poisonous food.
- Distribution across species. Example: Quick taste aversion learning in species with varied diets.
Proximate Cause:
- Biological and environmental events. Example: Taste aversion learning depends on amygdala and conditioning experiences.
- Emergence or change during development. Example: Taste aversion learning starts around weaning.

Humans have an inherited predisposition to be drawn to nature, including animals.
Explains human interest in pets, zoos, and observing animals.

Studied through stimulus discrimination.
Delayed Matching-to-Sample:
- Animal is shown a sample stimulus, then after a delay, selects the matching stimulus from alternatives.
- Measures ability to remember the stimulus.
Directed Forgetting:
- The subject is told to forget something.
- Pigeons perform worse on test phase following forget cue (X) compared to remember cue (O).

Evolutionary Adaptations: Traits that enhance survival or reproduction.
Food-storing birds (Clark’s nutcrackers, black-capped chickadees) store food in fall and retrieve it in winter.
Clark’s nutcrackers outperform other corvids in retrieval accuracy.
Food-storing birds rely on location.
Chickadees showed a strong preference for the location.
Hippocampus size is correlated with food storing.

Numerosity: Understanding of quantity.
Clever Hans:
- Horse that appeared to answer math questions by tapping hoof.
- Oskar Pfungst revealed Hans was responding to subtle cues from the questioner.
Otto Koehler:
- Trained birds to differentiate numerical values using direct matching-to-sample.
- Birds could match numbers up to six or seven.
Bucket Task:
- Researchers place items into a bucket and observe the subject's search behavior.
- Mongoose lemurs track proportional differences rather than absolute quantities.

Humans tend to stick with their initial choice, underperforming compared to pigeons.
Pigeons use empirical probability based on prior experience.
Humans use classical probability, attempting to calculate likelihood.
Humans exhibit confirmation bias.

Animals learn to categorize through discrimination training.
Pigeons can categorize "trees" and generalize to novel pictures.
Transitive Inference:
- Inferring relationships between objects based on their relationship to a third object (If A > B and B > C, then A > C).
- Ring-tailed lemurs (social species) excel at transitive inference.

Demonstrates understanding of object relationships and effects.
Simple Tool Use: Using an existing item (rock, twig).
Selectivity: Some species prefer specific tool weights or sizes.
Buzzards and vultures show some preference for the weight of rocks they use to crack open eggs.
Saving Tools: Implies expectation of future need.
Combining/Modifying Tools: Requires greater cognitive complexity.
Social Learning: Animals learn through observation.

Tendency to attribute mental states to others.
Understanding that others' minds differ from one's own.
Requires strict tests to avoid anthropomorphism.
Self-Awareness:
- Ability to see oneself as separate from others.
- Mark and Mirror Task: Tests self-awareness by marking the subject and observing their reaction in a mirror.

Intentional cooperation and deception require understanding what another individual knows.
Rope Task: Tests cooperation by requiring two animals to pull a rope simultaneously to get food.
Bonobos and tolerant carnivores cooperate well.
Chimpanzees are so competitive with one another that they have a difficult time cooperating..
Deception: Concealment of information or presentation of misinformation.
Chimps can deceive humans by pointing to the empty container.