Emory University, Atlanta, USA.
Yerkes National Primate Research Center, Atlanta, USA.
Anim Cogn. 2021 Jul;24(4):777-785. doi: 10.1007/s10071-021-01477-5. Epub 2021 Jan 21.
Adaptive decision making in humans depends on feedback between monitoring, which assesses mental states, and control, by which cognitive processes are modified. We investigated the extent to which monitoring and control interact iteratively in monkeys. Monkeys classified images as birds, fish, flowers, or people. At the beginning of each trial, to-be-classified images were not visible. Monkeys touched the image area to incrementally brighten the image, referred to as the brighten response. The amount by which brightness increased with each brighten response was unpredictable, and the monkeys could choose to classify the images at any time during a trial. We hypothesized that if monkeys monitored the status of their classification decision then they would seek information depending on the amount of information available. In Experiment 1, monkeys rarely used the brighten response when images were bright initially, and they used the brighten response more when earlier uses in a given trial yielded smaller amounts of information. In Experiment 2, monkeys made more brighten responses when the presented image did not belong in any of the trained categories, suggesting monkeys were sensitive to the fact that they could not reach a classification decision despite the image brightening. In Experiment 3, we found that the probability that monkeys used the brighten response correlated with their ability to correctly classify when the brighten response was not available. These findings add to the literature documenting the metacognitive skills of nonhuman primates by demonstrating an iterative feedback loop between cognitive monitoring and cognitive control that allows for adaptive information-seeking behavior.
人类的自适应决策取决于监测（评估心理状态）和控制（修改认知过程）之间的反馈。我们研究了监测和控制在猴子中迭代交互的程度。猴子将图像分类为鸟类、鱼类、花卉或人物。在每个试验开始时，待分类的图像不可见。猴子触摸图像区域以逐渐增加图像的亮度，称为增亮响应。每次增亮响应增加的亮度是不可预测的，猴子可以在试验过程中的任何时间选择对图像进行分类。我们假设如果猴子监测其分类决策的状态，那么他们将根据可用信息的数量寻求信息。在实验 1 中，当图像最初很亮时，猴子很少使用增亮响应，并且当在给定试验中的早期使用产生较少的信息量时，它们使用增亮响应更多。在实验 2 中，当呈现的图像不属于任何训练类别时，猴子会做出更多的增亮响应，这表明猴子对他们无法做出分类决策的事实很敏感，尽管图像在变亮。在实验 3 中，我们发现猴子使用增亮响应的概率与他们在增亮响应不可用时正确分类的能力相关。这些发现通过证明认知监测和认知控制之间的迭代反馈循环，为非人类灵长类动物的元认知技能增加了文献记录，从而允许自适应信息搜索行为。
