Wilkinson Anna, Reber Stephan A, Root-Gutteridge Holly, Dassow Angela, Whiting Martin J
School of Natural Sciences, University of Lincoln, Lincoln LN6 7TS, UK.
Cognitive Science, Lund University, 221 00 Lund, Sweden.
Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2025 May;380(1925):20240129. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2024.0129. Epub 2025 May 1.
It is becoming clear that the cognition of a species plays an important role in successful conservation, with cultural processes being a fundamental part of this. However, in contrast to mammals and birds, very little is known about cultural processes (and the social learning that underlies these) in reptiles. Here, we summarize the current state of knowledge, consider why this information is so limited and assess candidate behaviours observed in the wild, which warrant further investigation through the lens of cultural traditions. We then make suggestions for the fundamental next steps necessary to start to address this issue. This includes future experimental work and also consideration of how existing datasets, such as those capturing animal movement or acoustic activity, can be used to assess cultural questions. In addition, we emphasize the important role that engaging key conservation stakeholders, such as zoos, aquaria and ecotourism providers, could play in furthering our understanding of cultural behaviour in this group and the potential conservation implications of this knowledge. Whether there is cultural behaviour in reptiles and the relationship that this has with conservation remain unclear; however, the findings of this review suggest that these are areas worthy of further research.This article is part of the theme issue 'Animal culture: conservation in a changing world'.
越来越明显的是，对一个物种的认知在成功的保护中起着重要作用，文化过程是其中的一个基本部分。然而，与哺乳动物和鸟类不同，我们对爬行动物的文化过程（以及作为其基础的社会学习）知之甚少。在这里，我们总结了当前的知识状况，思考为什么这些信息如此有限，并评估在野外观察到的值得通过文化传统视角进一步研究的候选行为。然后，我们为开始解决这个问题所需的基本后续步骤提出建议。这包括未来的实验工作，以及考虑如何利用现有的数据集，如那些记录动物移动或声学活动的数据集，来评估文化问题。此外，我们强调吸引关键的保护利益相关者，如动物园、水族馆和生态旅游供应商，在增进我们对这一群体文化行为的理解以及这一知识的潜在保护意义方面可能发挥的重要作用。爬行动物是否存在文化行为以及这与保护的关系仍不明确；然而，本综述的结果表明，这些都是值得进一步研究的领域。本文是主题为“动物文化：变化世界中的保护”的一部分。
