speciWc to social learning

Abstract Previous laboratory studies on social learning suggest that some animals can learn more readily if they Wrst observe a conspeciWc demonstrator perform the task unsuc-cessfully and so fail to obtain a food reward than if they observe a successful demonstrator that obtains the food. This eVect may indicate a diVerence in how easily animals are able to associate diVerent outcomes with the conspeciWc or could simply be the result of having food present in only some of the demonstrations. To investigate we tested a scat-ter-hoarding mammal, the eastern grey squirrel, on its ability to learn to choose between two pots of food after watching a conspeciWc remove a nut from one of them on every trial. Squirrels that were rewarded for choosing the opposite pot to the conspeciWc chose correctly more frequently than squirrels rewarded for choosing the same pot (a feature-neg-ative eVect). Another group of squirrels was tested on their ability to choose between the two pots when the rewarded option was indicated by a piece of card. This time, squirrels showed no signiWcant diVerence in their ability to learn to choose the same or the opposite pot. The results add to anec-dotal reports that grey squirrels can learn by observing a conspeciWc and suggest that even when all subjects are pro-vided with demonstrations with the same content, not all learning occurs equally. Prior experience or expectations of the association between a cue (a conspeciWc) and food inXu-ences what can be learned through observation whilst previ-ously unfamiliar cues (the card) can be associated more readily with any outcome