ArticlePloS one2012
Identification of learning mechanisms in a wild meerkat population.
Article in PloS one, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 55 citations in OpenAlex.
- Individual variation in cognitive performance: developmental and evolutionary perspectives.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2012Pooled it
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- Social learning in otters.Royal Society open science · 2017Article
- Synchronized practice helps bearded capuchin monkeys learn to extend attention while learning a tradition.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2017Article
- Social networks predict selective observation and information spread in ravens.Royal Society open science · 2016Article
- How New Caledonian crows solve novel foraging problems and what it means for cumulative culture.Learning & behavior · 2016Article
- Tolerance and Social Facilitation in the Foraging Behaviour of Free-Ranging Crows (Ethology : formerly Zeitschrift fur Tierpsychologie · 2014Article
- Human-introduced long-term traditions in wild redfronted lemurs?Animal cognition · 2014Article
- 'Captivity bias' in animal tool use and its implications for the evolution of hominin technology.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2013Review
- Animal minds: from computation to evolution.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2012Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Vigorous debates as to the evolutionary origins of culture remain unresolved due to an absence of methods for identifying learning mechanisms in natural populations. While laboratory experiments on captive animals have revealed evidence for a number of mechanisms, these may not necessarily reflect the processes typically operating in nature. We developed a novel method that allows social and asocial learning mechanisms to be determined in animal groups from the patterns of interaction with, and solving of, a task. We deployed it to analyse learning in groups of wild meerkats (Suricata suricatta) presented with a novel foraging apparatus. We identify nine separate learning processes underlying the meerkats' foraging behaviour, in each case precisely quantifying their strength and duration, including local enhancement, emulation, and a hitherto unrecognized form of social learning, which we term 'observational perseverance'. Our analysis suggests a key factor underlying the stability of behavioural traditions is a high ratio of specific to generalized social learning effects. The approach has widespread potential as an ecologically valid tool to investigate learning mechanisms in natural groups of animals, including humans.
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Registered trials
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