Imprinting on time-structured acoustic stimuli in ducklings
Filial imprinting is a dedicated learning process that lacks explicit reinforcement. The phenomenon itself is narrowly heritably canalized, but its content, the representation of the parental object, reflects the circumstances of the newborn. Imprinting has recently been shown to be even more subtle...
| Hlavní autoři: | , , |
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| Médium: | Journal article |
| Jazyk: | English |
| Vydáno: |
Royal Society
2021
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| _version_ | 1826273905775476736 |
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| author | Monteiro, T Hart, T Kacelnik, A |
| author_facet | Monteiro, T Hart, T Kacelnik, A |
| author_sort | Monteiro, T |
| collection | OXFORD |
| description | Filial imprinting is a dedicated learning process that lacks explicit reinforcement. The phenomenon itself is narrowly heritably canalized, but its content, the representation of the parental object, reflects the circumstances of the newborn. Imprinting has recently been shown to be even more subtle and complex than previously envisaged, since ducklings and chicks are now known to select and represent for later generalization abstract conceptual properties of the objects they perceive as neonates, including movement pattern, heterogeneity and inter-component relationships of same or different. Here, we investigate day-old Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos) ducklings’ bias towards imprinting on acoustic stimuli made from mallards’ vocalizations as opposed to white noise, whether they imprint on the temporal structure of brief acoustic stimuli of either kind, and whether they generalize timing information across the two sounds. Our data are consistent with a strong innate preference for natural sounds, but do not reliably establish sensitivity to temporal relations. This fits with the view that imprinting includes the establishment of representations of both primary percepts and selective abstract properties of their early perceptual input, meshing together genetically transmitted prior pre-dispositions with active selection and processing of the perceptual input. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-06T22:35:20Z |
| format | Journal article |
| id | oxford-uuid:59b34e1e-eba8-420e-9b14-d49eb9c95df7 |
| institution | University of Oxford |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-06T22:35:20Z |
| publishDate | 2021 |
| publisher | Royal Society |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | oxford-uuid:59b34e1e-eba8-420e-9b14-d49eb9c95df72022-03-26T17:11:17ZImprinting on time-structured acoustic stimuli in ducklingsJournal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:59b34e1e-eba8-420e-9b14-d49eb9c95df7EnglishSymplectic ElementsRoyal Society2021Monteiro, THart, TKacelnik, AFilial imprinting is a dedicated learning process that lacks explicit reinforcement. The phenomenon itself is narrowly heritably canalized, but its content, the representation of the parental object, reflects the circumstances of the newborn. Imprinting has recently been shown to be even more subtle and complex than previously envisaged, since ducklings and chicks are now known to select and represent for later generalization abstract conceptual properties of the objects they perceive as neonates, including movement pattern, heterogeneity and inter-component relationships of same or different. Here, we investigate day-old Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos) ducklings’ bias towards imprinting on acoustic stimuli made from mallards’ vocalizations as opposed to white noise, whether they imprint on the temporal structure of brief acoustic stimuli of either kind, and whether they generalize timing information across the two sounds. Our data are consistent with a strong innate preference for natural sounds, but do not reliably establish sensitivity to temporal relations. This fits with the view that imprinting includes the establishment of representations of both primary percepts and selective abstract properties of their early perceptual input, meshing together genetically transmitted prior pre-dispositions with active selection and processing of the perceptual input. |
| spellingShingle | Monteiro, T Hart, T Kacelnik, A Imprinting on time-structured acoustic stimuli in ducklings |
| title | Imprinting on time-structured acoustic stimuli in ducklings |
| title_full | Imprinting on time-structured acoustic stimuli in ducklings |
| title_fullStr | Imprinting on time-structured acoustic stimuli in ducklings |
| title_full_unstemmed | Imprinting on time-structured acoustic stimuli in ducklings |
| title_short | Imprinting on time-structured acoustic stimuli in ducklings |
| title_sort | imprinting on time structured acoustic stimuli in ducklings |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT monteirot imprintingontimestructuredacousticstimuliinducklings AT hartt imprintingontimestructuredacousticstimuliinducklings AT kacelnika imprintingontimestructuredacousticstimuliinducklings |