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Male yellow-crowned bishops (Euplectes afer afer) acquire a novel foraging behaviour by social learning

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Abstract

This study investigated whether the socially foraging yellow-crowned bishop (Euplectes afer afer) was able to learn a problem-solving task by observing a conspecific. In the test group, subjects observed a demonstrator opening a box before being exposed to the same task. Birds from the control group did not receive a social demonstration. Five out of six individuals from the test group succeeded in opening the box whereas all six subjects of the control group failed to solve the task. Group foraging may have favoured the evolution of social learning in yellow-crowned bishops. However, only further studies will allow us to draw definitive conclusions about the evolutionary forces that shaped this cognitive ability, by comparing yellow-crowned bishops with non-social closely related species.

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Fig. 1

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by grants from the Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR) (Cognition and tool-use economy project, ECOTOOL, ANR-14-CE30-0015-01; F. Osiurak), and was performed within the framework of the LABEX CORTEX (ANR-11-LABX-0042) of the University of Lyon, within the program Investissements d’Avenir (ANR-11-IDEX-0007; F. Osiurak) operated by the ANR. S. Danel is very grateful to Sébastien Marcle for helping with the experiments and general support, and to Loup Martineau for drawing Fig. 1.

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Author notes

  1. Auguste M. P. von Bayern and François Osiurak contributed equally to this work and share the last authorship.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory for the Study of Cognitive Mechanisms, University of Lyon, 69500, Bron Rhône-Alpes, France

    Samara Danel & François Osiurak

  2. Department of Behavioural Biology, University of Vienna, Vienna, 1090, Austria

    Magdalena van Buuren

  3. Max-Planck-Institute for Ornithology, 82319, Seewiesen, Germany

    Samara Danel & Auguste M. P. von Bayern

  4. University Institute of France, 75005, Paris, France

    François Osiurak

Authors
  1. Samara Danel
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  2. Magdalena van Buuren
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  3. Auguste M. P. von Bayern
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  4. François Osiurak
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Correspondence to Samara Danel.

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Research involving animals

The animals’ care was in accordance with the guidelines of the University of Lyon.

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Danel, S., van Buuren, M., von Bayern, A.M.P. et al. Male yellow-crowned bishops (Euplectes afer afer) acquire a novel foraging behaviour by social learning. J Ethol 37, 235–239 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10164-019-00589-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10164-019-00589-3

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