West M J, King A P, Freeberg T M
Department of Biology, Indiana University, Bloomington 47405, USA.
J Comp Psychol. 1996 Mar;110(1):15-26. doi: 10.1037/0735-7036.110.1.15.
The social experiences of young Molothrus ater ater cowbirds were manipulated in a 2-year study. In the 1st year, males were housed with pairs of canaries. The males were tested in 3 social contexts. Also, vocal repertoires were recorded and played back to females. In contrast to a previous study of the M. a. artemisiae subspecies, the males did not vocalize to the canaries in courtship tests (T. M. Freeberg, A. P. King, & M. J. West, 1995) but showed incompetent courtship of female cowbirds. In their 2nd year, half of the males were housed with older males and female cowbirds, and half were housed with only females. Those exposed to older males courted much more successfully than did those deprived of such experience. All males developed new repertoires, and song potencies did not correlate across years. The data reveal intraspecific variation in the ontogeny of mate recognition but intraspecific dependence on social learning to acquire courtship skills.
在一项为期两年的研究中，对年轻褐头牛鹂（Molothrus ater ater）的社交经历进行了操控。在第一年，雄性褐头牛鹂与成对的金丝雀关在一起。这些雄性在三种社交情境下接受测试。此外，记录了它们的发声曲目并播放给雌性听。与之前对褐头牛鹂指名亚种（M. a. artemisiae）的研究不同，在求偶测试中，雄性褐头牛鹂不会对金丝雀发声（T. M. 弗里伯格、A. P. 金和M. J. 韦斯特，1995年），但对雌性褐头牛鹂的求偶表现不佳。在它们的第二年，一半的雄性与年长雄性和雌性褐头牛鹂关在一起，另一半只与雌性关在一起。那些接触过年长雄性的雄性求偶成功率比那些没有这种经历的雄性要高得多。所有雄性都发展出了新的发声曲目，而且不同年份的鸣叫能力没有相关性。数据揭示了种内配偶识别个体发生过程中的变异，但种内对通过社会学习获得求偶技能的依赖性。
