Brain size does not predict learning strategies in a serial reversal learning test.

ABSTRACT: Reversal learning assays are commonly used across a wide range of taxa to investigate associative learning and behavioural flexibility. In serial reversal learning, the reward contingency in a binary discrimination is reversed multiple times. Performance during serial reversal learning varies greatly at the interspecific level, as some animals adopt a rule-based strategy that enables them to switch quickly between reward contingencies. A larger relative brain size, generating enhanced learning ability and increased behavioural flexibility, has been proposed to be an important factor underlying this variation. Here, we experimentally tested this hypothesis at the intraspecific level. We used guppies (Poecilia reticulata) artificially selected for small and large relative brain size,

SUBMITTER: Boussard A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7413604 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature