LEARNING AND MOTIVATION 28, 424–445 (1997) ARTICLE NO. LM970975 Pigeons ' Use of Landmarks for Spatial Search in a Laboratory Arena and in Digitized Images of the Arena

Pigeons were trained in a touch-screen task and in an open-field task to search for a hidden goal using an array of landmarks to guide their search behavior. The touch-screen task presented digitized images of the open field landmarks and environment. Upon completion of training in each task, tests involving the alteration, shifting, or removal of landmarks were conducted to determine which landmark(s) and stimulus feature(s) controlled search behavior. In both tasks, proximity to the goal was an important determinant of landmark control. The overall patterns of landmark control showed both similarities and differences in the two tasks. No evidence was obtained that learning about the arrangement of landmarks and goal transferred across the two tasks. q 1997 Academic Press The processing of spatial information is a fundamental activity of virtually all organisms in that it is essential to such critical behaviors as procurement of food, establishment of a home territory, navigation through different envi-ronments, and evasion of predators. In recent years, considerable research effort has been devoted to investigating the strategies used by various animals to make accurate discriminations within a spatial context, and in particular to determining how visual landmarks control an animal’s search behavior (for reviews see Cheng & Spetch, in press; Gallistel, 1990). Pigeons ’ use of visual landmarks in searching for a goal has been investi-gated in several recent studies by Cheng, Spetch, and colleagues. Some o