Reznikova Zhanna, Panteleeva Sofia, Vorobyeva Nataliya
Institute of Systematics and Ecology of Animals, Siberian Branch RAS, Frunze 11, Novosibirsk, 630091, Russia.
Novosibirsk State University, Pirogova 2, Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia.
Anim Cogn. 2019 Mar;22(2):277-289. doi: 10.1007/s10071-019-01244-7. Epub 2019 Feb 1.
Applying the classical experimental scheme of training animals with food rewards to discriminate between quantities of visual stimuli, we demonstrated that not only can striped field mice Apodemus agrarius discriminate between clearly distinctive quantities such as 5 and 10, but some of these mice also exhibit high accuracy in discriminating between quantities that differ only by one. The latter include both small (such as 2 versus 3) and relatively large (such as 5 versus 6, and 8 versus 9) quantities of elements. This is the first evidence of precise relative-quantity judgement in wild rodents. We found striking individual variation in cognitive performance among striped field mice, which possibly reflects individual cognitive variation in natural populations. We speculate that high accuracy in differentiating large quantities is based on the adaptive ability of wild rodents to capture subtle changes in their environment. We suggest that the striped field mouse may be a powerful model species to develop advanced cognitive tests for comparative studies of numerical competence in animals and for understanding evolutionary roots of quantity processing.
应用用食物奖励训练动物以区分视觉刺激数量的经典实验方案，我们证明，不仅条纹田鼠（黑线姬鼠）能够区分5和10等明显不同的数量，而且其中一些小鼠在区分仅相差一个的数量时也表现出高精度。后者包括少量（如2对3）和相对大量（如5对6以及8对9）的元素。这是野生啮齿动物精确相对数量判断的首个证据。我们发现条纹田鼠的认知表现存在显著的个体差异，这可能反映了自然种群中的个体认知差异。我们推测，区分大量的高精度是基于野生啮齿动物捕捉其环境中细微变化的适应能力。我们认为，条纹田鼠可能是一个强大的模型物种，可用于开发先进的认知测试，以比较研究动物的数字能力，并理解数量处理的进化根源。
