Department of Zoology, Faculty of Life Sciences, Tel-Aviv University, Tel-Aviv 69978, Israel.
J Theor Biol. 2010 Dec 21;267(4):573-81. doi: 10.1016/j.jtbi.2010.09.026. Epub 2010 Sep 19.
Variation in learning abilities within populations suggests that complex learning may not necessarily be more adaptive than simple learning. Yet, the high cost of complex learning cannot fully explain this variation without some understanding of why complex learning is too costly for some individuals but not for others. Here we propose that different social foraging strategies can favor different learning strategies (that learn the environment with high or low resolution), thereby maintaining variable learning abilities within populations. Using a genetic algorithm in an agent-based evolutionary simulation of a social foraging game (the producer-scrounger game) we demonstrate how an association evolves between a strategy based on independent search for food (playing a producer) and a complex (high resolution) learning rule, while a strategy that combines independent search and following others (playing a scrounger) evolves an association with a simple (low resolution) learning rule. The reason for these associations is that for complex learning to have an advantage, a large number of learning steps, normally not achieved by scroungers, are necessary. These results offer a general explanation for persistent variation in cognitive abilities that is based on co-evolution of learning rules and social foraging strategies.
种群内学习能力的差异表明，复杂的学习未必比简单的学习更具适应性。然而，如果不了解为什么复杂的学习对某些个体来说过于昂贵，而对其他个体来说则不是，那么复杂学习的高成本并不能完全解释这种差异。在这里，我们提出不同的社会觅食策略可以有利于不同的学习策略（以高或低分辨率学习环境），从而在种群中维持可变的学习能力。我们使用基于代理的社会觅食博弈（生产者-觅食者博弈）的遗传算法进化模拟来证明，当一种基于独立寻找食物的策略（扮演生产者）与一种复杂的（高分辨率）学习规则之间产生关联时，另一种结合了独立寻找和跟随他人的策略（扮演觅食者）会与一种简单的（低分辨率）学习规则产生关联。这些关联的原因是，对于复杂的学习要有优势，通常需要大量的学习步骤，而觅食者无法达到这些步骤。这些结果为基于学习规则和社会觅食策略共同进化的认知能力持续变化提供了一个一般性解释。
