Laboratory of Evolutionary Physiology and Behavior, Chongqing Key Laboratory of Animal Biology, Chongqing Normal University, Chongqing, 401331, China.
Anim Cogn. 2024 Mar 2;27(1):6. doi: 10.1007/s10071-024-01837-x.
Several studies have reported that animals' personalities are often correlated with individual differences in cognition. Here, we tested whether personality is related to cognition across species, focusing on 10 freshwater fishes and a task relevant for fitness, the ability to discriminate shoal size. Bolder species exhibited more 'shuttle' behavior for information sampling during shoal selection and showed high performance (HP) in the numerical discrimination than shyer species, i.e., low performance (LP) species. Species at both the high and low ends of sociability showed LP, possibly due to loosened selection pressure because of either no need to perform shoal size discrimination tasks frequently in nature for very high sociability species or decreased willingness and motivation to join and stay within shoals for very low sociability species. Notably, the numerical discrimination was sensitive to the numerical contrast ratio in LP species but not in HP species, suggesting that the numerical system used for size discrimination also varied between species. Overall, we demonstrated the interspecies relationship between personality and shoal size discrimination across fish species, suggesting an evolutionary link between numerical abilities and behavior.
一些研究报告指出，动物的个性通常与认知个体差异相关。在这里，我们测试了个性是否与跨物种的认知有关，重点关注了 10 种淡水鱼类和一个与适应性相关的任务，即辨别鱼群大小的能力。在选择鱼群时，更大胆的物种表现出更多的“穿梭”行为来获取信息，并且在数字辨别任务中表现出较高的表现（HP），而相比之下，较为胆怯的物种表现出较低的表现（LP）。社交能力较高和较低的物种都表现出 LP，这可能是由于选择压力的放松，因为非常高社交能力的物种在自然界中可能不需要经常执行鱼群大小辨别任务，或者非常低社交能力的物种降低了加入和留在鱼群中的意愿和动机。值得注意的是，数字辨别对 LP 物种的数字对比率敏感，但对 HP 物种不敏感，这表明用于大小辨别的数字系统在物种之间也存在差异。总的来说，我们在鱼类物种之间展示了个性和鱼群大小辨别之间的种间关系，这表明数字能力和行为之间存在进化联系。
